Homecoming
by Fiver
Summary: Time changes people. And three years is a long time for change, as the spirits - especially a certain Thief King - discover upon their return to the modern world and their former hosts. DISCONTINUED - see profile for links to a condensed ending
1. Homecoming

_**Ok. I know I should not do this. I said I wouldn't upload a new story until I had written it in its entirety. And, well...this story has not been written in its entirety. In fact...I'm not even sure it's half-done. But what can I say? I guess I'm feedback-motivated. I find myself getting bored with it because I've read over it so many times and no one else has even seen it. So I break my word to you. But never fear. Should you wish to read this story, you will get at least ten 'quick' updates, since that whole part is done and dusted already. If I don't get myself moving...it could slow down after that. But hopefully that won't happen.**_

_**Summary: Time changes people. And three years is a long time for change, as the spirits - especially a certain Thief King - discover upon their return to the modern world and their former hosts. For one of those hosts, it's a dream come true. For another, it's their worst nightmare. And for one, it's just another painful part of their downward spiral.**_

**_Disclaimer: I own nothing except the plot and any characters not from Yu-Gi-Oh._**

_**Chapter 1: Homecoming**_

The first thing he heard when he awoke that morning was a hoarse, startled cry – the kind of sound you make when you're watching a horror movie and the terrifying, snarling CGI monster suddenly bursts out of the bushes and lunges towards you at inhuman speed, and you think it's going to eat you even though it only exists in the world of the T.V.

After a considerable interval, during which the surprise of the first sound started to wear off and he began to doze off again, the second thing he heard was the utterance of his own name, in a voice very familiar to him, even though he hadn't heard it in years.

"_Yuugi!"_

He gasped and sat bolt-upright, all traces of sleepiness gone now.

And the third thing he heard was his grandpa banging on his bedroom door and telling him that breakfast was ready.

Yuugi blinked and looked around his room.

Empty. As always.

He sighed and lay back down. He'd been dreaming about his duelling days again, fighting side by side with the Pharaoh, and he supposed that well-remembered voice had been an echo from his dream, resounding in his sleep-fogged mind. An echo, a memory, and nothing more.

"Nngh…happy memories…" he mumbled, sitting up and stretching and forcing himself to leave the comfort of his bed. He crossed the room to his wardrobe and started rooting around inside for clothes. As he did so, he caught a glimpse of himself in the nearby mirror. He smiled slightly. He really needed to get himself some new pyjamas. Since he'd finally taken his much-due growth spurt at the age of nineteen, these kiddie ones with their yellow polka-dots were rather too small for him. He still wasn't exactly basketball superstar material, and probably never would be, but the bottoms of his pyjama trousers now only reached mid-calf, and that was good enough for him.

His dream had put him in a reminiscent sort of mood, so he pulled on clothes similar to his old attire; blue jeans, black tank top, and the first pair of matching sneakers he could find. His neck still looked oddly bare when he dressed like this, as if the look would just never be quite complete without the Millennium Puzzle on its silver chain.

"Yuugi! The food is getting cold!"

"Coming, grandpa!" he called, making one brief and futile attempt to make his hair sit neatly before giving up and going downstairs.

"Morning," he said as he entered the kitchen and poured himself a cup of tea from the pot on the stove.

"Good morning, lazybones," Sugoroku said as he sat down next to him at the table. "Honestly, I don't know how you used to make it to school on time."

"Neither do I," Yuugi admitted with a laugh, helping himself to a piece of toast and starting to smother it in peanut butter.

"I might need your help in the shop today," his grandpa said. "There's a big delivery coming in. You don't have college, do you?"

"No, gramps, Wednesday is one of my days off," Yuugi said. "I have some reading to do, but I can do it in the evening. I'll come help out."

"Thank you," Sugoroku said warmly, donning the oven gloves and retrieving the breakfast waffles from the oven, where he'd put them to keep hot until his grandson made an appearance. Just as he lifted the tray out, the doorbell rang.

"Could you get that, Yuugi?" he requested as he tried to find a surface to set the tray down on.

"Sure," Yuugi replied, jumping up and heading for the hallway, still munching his toast. He reached the front door and fiddled with the lock awkwardly with his one free hand. It eventually clicked and he turned the handle and opened the door.

"Yuugi…!"

"Hello, can I help-?"

He trailed off and stared wide-eyed when he saw the person on the doorstep. Without him really noticing, his half-eaten slice of toast slid from his hand and landed with a peanut-butter-side-down splat on the welcome mat.

"_Mou hitori no boku,_" he breathed, hardly daring to believe it.

The ancient Pharaoh looked at him with the same amazed expression for a moment, and then he smiled.

"No, Yuugi," he said. "I'm Atemu."

What happened next was really a sort of blur for Yuugi. The next thing he was properly aware of was sitting back at the kitchen table, Atemu to his left and a very surprised Sugoroku to his right.

He kept expecting to wake up and find this was yet another dream. How could Atemu be here, in the flesh, after almost three years of complete absence? And he was, quite literally, 'in the flesh', which was bizarre in itself. Not only was he back, he had his own body now? The only times he'd seen the Pharaoh as a separate entity had been in the Memory World, and the Ceremonial Duel…

"How…how are you here?" he asked finally when his head stopped spinning.

"I don't know…" his look-alike confessed. "It just sort of…happened. One minute there was nothing, then a huge flash of light…and I was here in Domino. I woke up outside your school."

Technically it was his _old _school now, since he'd graduated, but Yuugi didn't even think about correcting him.

"But…but _how_?" he questioned meekly, too dazed and confused to say much else.

"I don't know," Atemu said again with a smile, "But I'm glad to be back."

Yuugi suddenly realised that he'd been so busy feeling shocked and stunned that it hadn't even occurred to him that he was _happy _to see his old friend again. All at once his heart swelled with joy until he thought it might burst and his face broke into a huge smile.

"I'm glad you're back too!" he said in delight as it finally sunk in that Atemu was here, _really _here, and he could talk to him and laugh with him again instead of just remembering. "I don't know how or why, but who cares? It's so great to see you again!"

He couldn't find any more words to express how totally euphoric he felt, so he just stood up and hugged his yami tightly, something he'd never been able to do before.

"Yes…I've missed you, aibou," Atemu said, still smiling. He seemed a little uncertain about the hugging thing, but at length returned the gesture tentatively.

"Well, I have no idea what's going on," Sugoroku announced. "But yes, it's nice to have you back. Would you like some breakfast?"

Both doppelgangers laughed at the older man's ready acceptance of this unusual twist of fate.

"Yes, grandpa," Atemu said gladly. "I'd like that very much."

"So…do you think you're back for good this time?" Yuugi asked as Sugoroku loaded their plates with syrup-soaked waffles and pieces of fruit. "Or is there just something you have to do?"

"I really have no idea," Atemu said. "I'd like to think it's a permanent arrangement."

"It must be," Yuugi decided. "You have your own body this time. It's so weird, I can just reach out and touch you…!"

"Indeed," Atemu said, looking amused by his incredulity. "It's pleasant to be able to just sit across from you, like normal friends would. Yes, it does seem more definite this time. My destiny with the Millennium Items and the Shadow Games was fulfilled…I don't think I've been brought back just to complete another task. Perhaps…we've been given another chance at life."

Yuugi frowned.

"We…?" he repeated, puzzled.

"Oh yes, I forgot to say…" the Pharaoh said. "It seems I'm not the only one who has been brought back."

Yuugi gasped.

"The other spirits too?" he questioned.

"Yes. At least, I thought I saw them in that flash of light. Mariku and…" Atemu hesitated for a moment, "And Bakura."

"What do you suppose they'll do?" Yuugi asked, concerned.

"Seek out their lighter halves, I suppose," Atemu said. "I felt compelled to come here. I was almost _pulled _towards this house, and I knew it was to find you, even though I had no way of knowing if this was still where you lived."

"Yup, nineteen years old and still living with my grandpa," Yuugi laughed.

"Nineteen? Is that how old you are now?" Atemu asked in bewilderment.

"That's right," Yuugi said with a grin. "All grown up. I bet I'm taller than you now!"

They stood up and compared, but Atemu proved to still be slightly taller.

"Not fair," Yuugi complained. "You must have grown too."

"So it would seem…" Atemu agreed, looking down at the physical form he was still getting to grips with. "I wonder how?"

"Who knows?" Yuugi said with a shrug, attacking his plate of waffles. "So you think the other two are going to find Malik and Ryou?"

"I can only assume so."

"Hmm…we might be seeing Mariku soon, then."

"Hm? How? Isn't Malik in Egypt?"

"Nope, he came over here to study," Yuugi explained, "He attends the same college as me. Lives really nearby. He works part-time in the game shop, too."

"Really?" Atemu mused, thinking of the feisty young tomb-keeper. "Who would have thought it…?"

Suddenly his expression turned anxious.

"What about Ryou?" he asked. "Where does he live?"

"Oh…not too far away," Yuugi said vaguely.

"So if Bakura came back into this world around the same time and place as me, he could find him at any time?"

"Sounds about right."

"Shouldn't we try and contact him, to warn him that Bakura is back?" Atemu questioned, confused at Yuugi's apparent lack of concern. "He could get a terrible scare."

"I'm…more worried about Bakura, to be honest," Yuugi said with a dry smile, setting his cutlery down. Atemu stared at him.

"_What?_" he asked, suitably perplexed.

Yuugi shifted uncomfortably.

"After you guys left…Ryou, he…he sort of…changed," he said slowly.

Atemu thought of the shy, polite Ryou Bakura he remembered and tried to imagine him any different.

"What do you mean, aibou?" he asked.

Yuugi sighed.

"Let me put it this way," he said, spearing a piece of waffle with his fork, "If Bakura thinks he can just walk back into Ryou's life and take control again…he is _very _sadly mistaken."

* * *

"What a dump."

The white-haired yami looked up at the grimy tower-block looming up before him with equal measures of amusement and disgust. He knew his hikari was in there somewhere. Ever since he had inexplicably materialised back into this wretched world that morning, there had been an odd pulling sensation in his head and chest, tugging him in a certain direction, and somehow he just knew it was leading him back to his old host. And this was where it had taken him.

"Heh…you were always such a high-class little brat," he said with cold humour, examining some obscene graffiti on the side wall, "Who would have thought you'd end up in a shit-hole like this?"

He approached the main entrance. There was an ancient-looking intercom, with a buzzer for every apartment, but the door had been smashed half-off its hinges, so he just slipped inside.

He followed the pull of his connection to his light. It grew consistently stronger as he climbed the flights of concrete steps until he was standing outside a door on the second floor. The landing was dark, cold and smelled of damp. The door was green, with the paint flaking in places.

There was a doorbell, but he ignored it. Surely it would be a lot more fun to…_surprise _his little light.

He reached into the pocket of his trench-coat – he was wearing the same clothes he'd last worn in this world – and extracted one of many paperclips. Such useful little things. After unbending it until it was just a wobbly piece of wire, he inserted it into the keyhole and manoeuvred it carefully until he heard the lock click. He smirked at the satisfying sound and leaned against the door, pushing it open silently.

There was a radio playing inside the apartment, some cheery tune chirping away to itself. He stepped into the hallway and shut the door quietly behind him.

He advanced slowly, trying to determine his hikari's exact location. He was about to start searching the rooms one by one when he heard a movement behind him.

He started to turn around, but before he could see who or what it was that was lurking in wait, something connected suddenly and excruciatingly with his back.

He was sent sprawling to the floor, swearing in agony.

"You shouldn't make such a fuss. That's what happens when you break into someone else's house."

Bakura froze at that voice. It was devastatingly familiar, and yet somehow totally alien to him.

"Who are you? Turn around," the voice ordered.

His mouth twisted into a sadistic smirk. Yes…he knew that voice.

Ignoring the considerable pain in the middle of his spine, Bakura got to his feet and turned, keeping his head down.

"Hello, hikari," he said in a sardonically pleasant tone. He raised his head and locked eyes with his light.

He could see that Ryou was taller now than before, and holding a baseball bat, which explained a lot, but gave these things little thought. It was the eyes he wanted to see; to see them flood with sudden recognition and the usual fear, and then to see the boy fall to his knees and beg forgiveness for daring to hurt him, or just cower in a corner in absolute terror.

Those large brown eyes stared at him, and sure enough they widened in recognition. But there were no tears, no apologies, no screams of terror.

All the teen did was swing the bat again, cracking Bakura on the side of the head and plunging him into darkness.

* * *

"Man, I still can't believe you're back!" Jounouchi grinned. "This is too awesome!"

Yuugi laughed to himself as his friends all tried to get their heads around Atemu's unexpected return. He'd called them all to the game shop to tell them, and they were all now sitting on various crates in one of the stock rooms.

"The shop has certainly grown…" Atemu remarked, looking around.

"Yeah, we ended up doing a merger with Otogi's place," Yuugi said brightly. "We've expanded!"

"But Atemu…" Anzu spoke up. "You said the other spirits are back too?"

"Yes," he confirmed, nodding.

"Uh-oh," she said with a grimace. "Is that good or bad?"

"I don't know," Atemu said. "But I think perhaps we should forewarn Ryou and Malik…to lessen the shock."

Jounouchi snorted.

"Yeah, we should warn _Malik_," he said. "As for-"

"Someone call me?"

A sandy-blond head poked through the plastic curtain leading to the adjoining store room.

"Oh, hi Malik," Yuugi said. "I didn't know you were here today."

"No rest for the wicked," Malik laughed. "What are you guys all doing here?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Anzu said teasingly. Malik looked at her dubiously before his lavender eyes found Atemu.

"…_Pharaoh?_" he gaped after a moment's stunned silence.

"Yes," Atemu said, looking amused again at the goggle-eyed reaction he was getting from everyone when they first saw him. "But really…call me Atemu."

And so the whole story – which wasn't really much – had to be related once again. Malik listened with astonishment and, towards the end, dread.

"So, he…Mariku's back?" he questioned fearfully.

"Yes. But I don't think he intends to cause you harm, Malik," Atemu said, placing a hand on the Egyptian teen's shoulder.

"I hope you're right…" Malik murmured, looking despondently at the floor and appearing distinctly unconvinced.

"What about Ryou?" Honda asked. "Should we go check up on him?"

"I'm sure he's fine," Jounouchi said, rolling his eyes. "Although, I would kinda like to go just to see the look on Bakura's face…"

"Please," Atemu said, feeling lost. "What are you all talking about?"

"It's like I said…" Yuugi shrugged. "Ryou changed."

"Yes, but…in what way? Why?"

"I think…he was angry about what happened to him," Anzu said sadly. "Y'know…for Yuugi it seemed like _destiny _that he received his Millennium Item. For Ryou it was more like bad luck. Yuugi was special, Ryou was unfortunate. You know what I mean?"

"I don't think we can really explain to you the way he is now," Yuugi said quietly. "You'll have to see him for yourself to understand. And to believe it."

Atemu looked at them all with a very troubled expression, worried that he and his old enemy's dabbling with time might have _really_ caused serious damage to someone here in the present.

* * *

…

His head _really _hurt.

Bakura groaned slightly and raised a hand to his throbbing temple.

He opened his eyes and his vision filled with laminate wood flooring. He was lying on the ground. He sat up woozily, still feeling at the sizeable lump forming on the side of his head.

Where was he again-?

"Don't stand up."

At that voice it all came crashing back. Ryou had done this to him. _Ryou!_

He turned furiously in the direction of the voice.

And what he saw made his anger drain away.

"Hikari…?"

The sight of Zorc dancing in a field of pink flowers whilst wearing a fluffy tutu and tiara could not have shocked him more than the sight of nineteen year-old Ryou.

He stood with his back against the wall, the baseball bat – which he seemed to use as a fucking self-defence weapon – still dangling loosely from his deceptively slender fingers. Bakura's first impression had been correct; Ryou was indeed taller now, though probably still not quite as tall as himself. He was as skinny as ever, but he didn't look as delicate as Bakura remembered. He wore a pair of faded jeans and a close-fitting black V-neck t-shirt. His feet were bare. His jeans were torn across the right knee, and that was wrong in itself – Ryou had always been so finicky about his appearance.

And the sweet, gentle kindness that had _always_ been there, without fail, no matter the situation, seemed to have _vanished. _That heart-shaped face that had only ever looked upon him with timid awe and all-forgiving kindness, now observed him dispassionately, coldly, and those chocolate-brown eyes were just _hateful_.

The transformation was unnerving.

"Hikari, what-?" Bakura started.

"Don't call me that," Ryou snapped, stepping away from the wall. He sounded different too, which would explain why Bakura hadn't been able to immediately place his voice. Well, his _voice _was the same – of course, nothing short of heavy smoking and excessive drinking could really alter a person's voice – but it was heavily laden with biting frost, and his tone sported a harshness it had never had before. Still, despite his surprise at this apparent change of manner, Bakura felt his blood boil at his light speaking to him in such a way.

"I'll call you whatever I like," he growled.

"Shut up," Ryou said absently.

The rebuke was so unexpected that Bakura actually did fall silent.

There was a dining chair in the middle of the hallway, where Ryou must have sat at some point, waiting for Bakura to awaken. He grabbed it again now and sat down, albeit backwards, his long legs straddling the chair's high back. He folded his arms and rested his chin on them, watching his yami intently and chewing meditatively on his lower lip.

Neither of them spoke. The radio wasn't playing any more, so the apartment was swamped in silence. The hallway was getting dark now, with long shadows stretching across the floor, and Bakura realised he must have been out for quite some time.

"How are you back?" Ryou asked finally. "And why are you here?"

Bakura shot him a warning glare, not liking his impertinent tone. Ryou appeared unmoved.

"I don't know," he growled. "It just happened. I don't waste my time questioning these things."

Ryou looked at him witheringly.

"So _why _are you here?" he asked again.

"I don't know!" Bakura snarled. "We're still connected. I didn't have anything _better _to do than come and find you."

"And what do you want?" Ryou demanded.

"_I don't know!_" Bakura roared for the third time. "Damnit, what's your problem? I don't need your body anymore, and there are no Millennium Items left to fight for, so it's not like I came back just to _hurt _you-!"

"Bullshit," Ryou spat.

Bakura stared at him, stunned. The word sounded so _wrong _falling from Ryou's lips, as it would if a tiny child said it. It was like poison dripping from his tongue.

"As for what my _problem_ is…" the teen went on icily, getting to his feet and moving towards him until he stood directly above him. "_You ruined my life_."

His grip tightened angrily around the baseball bat, and Bakura, from his spot on the floor, couldn't deny that he felt slightly threatened.

"You screwed up _everything_," Ryou hissed, pretty features scowling in a way that seemed unnatural and, again, just _wrong_.

He raised the bat above his head, his lean frame trembling with emotion.

"I could kill you right now," he said shakily. "I could hurt you like you hurt me."

Bakura was more shocked than scared, but either way he was lost for words.

Ryou's knuckles were white around the handle of the bat, and for a moment Bakura truly thought that the life he'd been given only that morning was fated to end right here and now.

But then the boy gave an enraged yell, perhaps frustrated at his own lack of brutality, and threw the bat savagely across the room instead. It hit the opposite wall with a resounding clatter. He raised his hand and slapped Bakura hard across the face. He was astonished by the strength in that blow, and how much it stung, and how it left his ears ringing.

"Get out," Ryou said quietly and coldly, not looking at him. "Get out of here. I don't care what you do with your new life, but stay the _hell _away from me. Now _get out!_"

He turned his back on him, limbs shaking. And for the first time he could remember, Bakura obeyed his light without a word, leaving the apartment in a rather undignified hurry.

* * *

_**Hoorah, chapter 1 is finished.**_

_**Ryou kicks butt! xD Ooh…what HAVE I done?**_

**_Call it OOC if you like :P Personally, it's something I've always wanted to see. Doesn't fanon!Ryou's typical subservience drive anyone else crazy from time to time?_**

**_Review?_**

**_Fiver x_**


	2. Hello Again

_**Chapter 2:**__** Hello Again**_

"A-te-mu."

"Hm?"

The Pharaoh snapped out of his daze to see his light standing next to him, looking amused.

"Penny for your thoughts," Yuugi said, sitting on the edge of the bed. They were back at the house, in the spare bedroom that Atemu would be using as his own.

"Oh…they aren't worth a penny," Atemu replied vaguely, looking away.

"Come on, you clearly have something on your mind," Yuugi said, pulling on his wrist until he sat down beside him. "You've been all quiet ever since the others left."

"It's nothing," he said. "Really."

He'd been gone from Yuugi's life for three years, and had only been back for one day, and already it was as if he'd never left. His light could read him like an open book.

"If you don't tell me, I'll just look inside your head and find out anyway," Yuugi threatened jokingly. Atemu looked at him and arched an eyebrow, mystified.

"What?" he asked.

"I think our link still exists," Yuugi explained earnestly. "When I woke up this morning, I heard you. I heard you cry out, as if you had a shock, and then I heard you calling for me. In my head."

"Really?" Atemu questioned, surprised. "That's…unexpected. Now that I've found you…I thought the connection would have broken…"

"Doesn't seem that way. I still feel it."

Atemu closed his eyes for a moment, forehead creasing into a slight frown as he searched.

"You're right," he said at length. "I feel it too."

"No secrets for either of us," Yuugi said with a grin. Atemu didn't laugh. His eyes were fixed on the opposite wall, faintly uneasy.

"I suppose that means…the others…" he started apprehensively.

"…You're still worried about Ryou, aren't you?" Yuugi said after he trailed off. Atemu sighed.

"I can't help it," he said. "Bakura isn't exactly the most pleasant person to show up on anyone's doorstep, least of all Ryou. I hate to think what he might do to him."

"Ryou can take care of himself," Yuugi said consolingly.

"You keep saying that, but do you really believe it?" Atemu asked morosely. "I know you say he's 'changed', but do you think that will matter to Bakura? He might hurt him, just like always."

"How do you know he even went looking for Ryou?" Yuugi pointed out. "You came looking for me because we were friends before. We helped each other, and we were more than just a spirit and his host. Ryou and Bakura were never like that. For Bakura, Ryou was just a tool. He used him. He doesn't need him any more. So why would he go looking for him?"

"Because," Atemu said slowly, "Ryou is his only real connection to this world – the only thing that really anchors him here. They are tied to each other. And whether they like it or not, they share a bond."

"I see…"

"And anyway, Bakura is a malicious creature," Atemu said darkly. "He doesn't feel the need to justify his actions. He might seek Ryou out for the sole purpose of hurting him, for no reason other than enjoying seeing him in pain."

Yuugi placed a comforting hand on his arm. Atemu once again marvelled at his own solidity, amazed at how effortlessly he and his light could now interact physically, something that their friendship had sorely lacked before.

"If you're so worried, we can go check up on Ryou tomorrow," Yuugi offered. "I have a class in the afternoon, but we could go in the morning."

Atemu frowned, puzzled.

"Shouldn't we just go now?" he asked.

"No," Yuugi replied immediately, looking alarmed at the very idea.

"Why not…?" Atemu questioned, becoming increasingly perplexed.

"Because…it's dark…" Yuugi mumbled.

"You're nineteen and still not allowed out after dark?" Atemu queried, faintly amused. "Or are you scared?"

"It's not that…" he said, looking away awkwardly. "It's…you see…where Ryou lives, it's not a good place to go. Even in broad daylight, it's not a good place to go. At night it's just plain dangerous."

Atemu stared at him.

"He lives in a bad area?" he asked. "Alone?"

"…Yes," Yuugi said frankly. "South side of the city. Nasty place."

"Aibou, what's happened here?" Atemu almost pleaded. "Evidently I've missed something rather significant in my absence…"

"Don't worry, you'll probably get some answers tomorrow," Yuugi said with a quick smile. "And I promise, we _will _go tomorrow. But I have some reading to do before college so I'd better go…you should try and get some sleep, it's been a crazy day."

And with that he hurriedly left the room to find his textbook, leaving Atemu feeling very apprehensive about just what he would discover the next morning.

* * *

Malik hurried through the streets in the dying evening light. He felt a little uneasy wandering around like this, especially in the gathering dark, when he knew his yami was out there somewhere. Unfortunately, he knew his mind insisted upon the most foolish notions – it, not his conscious self, decided when he absolutely had to do something. Call it instinct. Or obsessive compulsive disorder.

Realistically, the task he'd set himself was pretty impossible. How was he going to find one person in this crowded city, with absolutely no idea even to their rough location?

"Well, whatever," he muttered, not faltering in his pace. He was a believer in fate. If he was supposed to find him, he'd find him.

And, of course, it _was _Bakura he was looking for. If he just followed the sounds of terrified mortals screaming, they'd probably lead him straight to him.

But, then again, that could just as easily be Mariku.

He smiled humourlessly and continued his search.

Suddenly, Malik saw him. Just like that, he was there. He was standing in the entrance to a side-street, half-concealed by shadow, his crimson eyes watching people closely as they bustled past. Looking for some rich fool to pickpocket, no doubt. Well, maybe this once it was understandable, and almost excusable. After all, he was totally alone in the world, with no means of survival. His past as the Thief King meant it was almost instinctual for him to steal for a living.

Malik approached him quietly, but the dark spirit heard him anyway and turned to fix him with his piercing stare. Bakura always had a way of sensing when his presence had been noticed, and right now he seemed even more on-edge than usual.

Malik disguised a smirk as a smile of greeting. He could guess why.

Bakura scowled when he recognized him.

"What do _you _want?" he asked sourly as Malik came to stand next to him, not flattering him with his gaze anymore now that he knew he was no threat.

"Wow," Malik whistled in appraisement, looking at the purpling, bruised bump on the side of the yami's head – he'd bet there was more of it under all that hair, too – and the lingering stark red mark on one cheek. "You're a mess."

Bakura scowled a bit more and said nothing.

"Hm. _My _guess is – and I'm just spit-balling here - that you either bashed your head against a brick wall in an act of pure masochism…" Malik said faux-musingly, a thoughtful finger at his mouth. "_Or_ you found Ryou."

At that Bakura did look at him, eyes narrowed.

"What do you want?" he demanded again. "As delightful as this little reunion is."

"He's different now, isn't he?" Malik said, ignoring the question. "Bet that caught you by surprise."

Bakura shrugged haughtily.

"It's not like it matters," he said. "I don't even know why I went looking for him in the first place. He's useless to me. If we both hate each other, it's probably a good thing."

"You really don't know why you went?" Malik asked, raising his eyebrows ever so slightly.

"There was no reason behind it," Bakura snapped.

"Maybe there was. Maybe you went looking for him because maybe just one little shred of your cruel, twisted soul wants to help him," Malik said flatly.

Bakura gave a short, harsh laugh.

"_Help _him?" he scoffed. "I don't owe him anything."

Malik pinned him with a sharp look in his lavender eyes.

"You owe him his _life _back, Bakura," he said quietly but bluntly.

The yami looked at him blankly for a moment,but at length he merely shrugged.

"I don't care if his life is messed up and he blames me for it," he sneered. "I'm not wasting any more of my time on him. I suppose he has to earn his own living now? Just a spoilt brat struggling to survive without mummy and daddy's pay-check?"

Malik shot him a disapproving frown.

"Keep talking like that and I'll slap the other side of your face," he said warningly.

Bakura gave an irritated growl and stalked away, but the sandy-blond followed him step for step.

"Besides," Malik continued, knowing he was annoying the yami and enjoying it thoroughly, "You're just pissed off that Ryou's taking none of your crap now. You thought you could just show up and kick him into submission again, and he turned around and kicked you right back, like he should have done years ago."

Bakura stopped and whirled around to face him so abruptly that he nearly walked into him.

"Did you _want _something, Malik?" he ground out.

"Actually, yes," he said, lips twitching as he fought back a smile. "I was wondering if you had somewhere to stay."

"Considering I don't even legally _exist _in this world, and have nothing to my name," Bakura said patronizingly, "It would be kind of _difficult _for me to have accommodation sorted out after just one day."

"You can crash at my place, if you want," Malik said, disregarding the yami's acidic tone. "I'm just a struggling student, so it's not exactly fancy. But I imagine it's better than a park bench."

Bakura regarded him suspiciously.

"What?" he questioned at length. Malik rolled his eyes.

"Do I need to spell it out for you?" he said. "You can stay at my apartment if you need to. There's a sofa-bed and, hopefully, enough food for two. It's your choice. Either way, I'm heading back now. It's getting late."

Without even giving Bakura a chance to reply, he turned on his heel and started walking back to his apartment. After a few moments, he knew without turning around that the yami had begun to follow.

Malik reached the front door of his building and turned his key in the lock. He could see Bakura out of the corner of his eye, standing at a wary distance, looking up at the modern, clean, well-kept apartment block.

"Kind of a far shot from Ryou's place, huh?" Malik said with a melancholy smile. Bakura nodded grudgingly.

"Come on…" Malik sighed, pushing the door open and stepping inside. Bakura stopped him with a hand on his arm.

"Why are you doing this?" he demanded, distrust lurking in his crimson eyes. "You don't…owe me anything."

Malik gave a short, heady laugh and grabbed his wrist, pulling him inside.

"That's the difference between you and me, Bakura," he said. "I don't need to."

Malik's little home was, as he had said, nothing fancy. It had a bedroom, a bathroom, a living room with a kitchenette and one large walk-in cupboard. It was cosily furnished, though, and untidy in a friendly sort of way.

"Whoops…" the Egyptian teen said, scooping up an alarmingly large pile of books and study notes from the sofa and dumping them on the table instead. "I was last-minute cramming the other night…never got around to tidying up again…shit, Isis would kill me if she could see this place…"

It was late, and Malik had eaten hours ago. He told Bakura to go and look in the fridge for something if he was hungry, but he shook his head, lips pressed together firmly in a thin line. It was painfully obvious that he was very uncertain of this civility, this offer of assistance for nothing in return. Malik smiled ruefully to himself. If it had been Ryou doing this for him, Bakura wouldn't have been surprised – he had probably _expected _that. But he could understand his doubt and suspicion at _him _extending such consideration. After all, he'd once been almost as bad as Bakura, only doing something if he himself could benefit from it.

He shook his head and tried not to remember.

"Maybe you should be thinking more about your own darkness," Bakura said suddenly. "What will you do if he shows up?"

Malik's hands stilled for a brief moment before he continued shifting clutter with renewed vigour.

"I don't think he will," he said as lightly as he could. "Pharaoh said he believed Mariku doesn't intend to hurt me. That sort of implies he doesn't intend to see me at all."

"Is that true?"

"You should know better than anyone, Bakura. I'm sure you remember our duel against him. Heh, we were some team, huh? We bickered so much you'd think we were trying to make the situation worse…"

"…You're afraid of him," Bakura said in realisation.

Malik laughed again, albeit weakly.

"Not everyone's changed as drastically as Ryou these past few years," he said.

"You seem to have changed considerably…" Bakura said distantly, picking up one of his textbooks and leafing through it.

"You think so?"

"Hn. What the hell is all this about?"

Bakura pointed to the page he was at.

He didn't want to say to Malik that even now, at the first impressions stage, he seemed so very different - a much less tightly-wound, vastly calmer and entirely better-adjusted version of the boy he remembered. It wasn't in his nature to say nice things to people.

"It's a psychology textbook. It's about psychology," Malik said plainly.

"That sounds modern and typically useless," Bakura said, looking bored already. "You know things like that didn't exist in my time."

"Yeah, well, maybe you wouldn't be so messed up if they had…" Malik mused out loud, earning himself a glare. "It's the study of the mind. How it works, why it goes wrong sometimes… y'know."

"I know. And you know," Bakura said with a small smirk in his direction. He stopped when the blonde's face reddened slightly and he looked away.

"So why are you reading about it, anyway?" Bakura asked gruffly when the silence went unbroken for a few moments.

"Because I'm studying psychology," Malik said, plucking the book from his hands. "At college."

"Why?" Bakura asked, raising a sceptical eyebrow.

"Because I felt like it," Malik said absently.

He finally finished clearing the sofa and went to put all his books in his room. When he came back, Bakura was sitting on the sofa, uncomfortably, right at the edge, staring off into nothing.

"How badly beat up is your head, by the way?" Malik asked, standing in front of him. "Bleeding?"

"No," Bakura muttered.

"Seeing double?"

"No."

"Hn. No emergency call required, then?"

"_No._"

The room spiralled into silence. Malik wished the yami would sit back like a normal person, instead of perching on the edge of the sofa as if he would have to bolt for the door at any given moment.

"…I don't get it," Bakura said at length to no one in particular. "Why the hell am I here, with this 'new life'…?"

"No clue," Malik shrugged. "It's not like you deserve it. But you're an idiot if you don't think it could have something to do with Ryou."

"Why must everything revolve around him?" Bakura growled.

"Because even though you're not sharing his body any more, you're still connected to him…right?"

Bakura looked at him, eyes narrowed suspiciously.

"How did you know that?" he asked coldly. Malik shrugged again.

"Yuugi said something similar about him and Pharaoh. It would make sense that you and Ryou would still be connected too."

"It makes no sense at all," Bakura muttered venomously.

"Doesn't the fact that your 'connection' to him still exists suggest that you're not quite finished with each other yet?" Malik questioned.

"Maybe," Bakura said aggressively. "I don't care."

"I suppose it wouldn't do any good if we locked you two in a room together until you reached some kind of understanding?"

"If you did that, one of us would end up dead."

Malik laughed.

"What?" Bakura questioned irritably.

"Before, you would have said 'Ryou would end up dead'," he said. "You think _he _could kill _you _now?"

"He almost did," the yami muttered darkly. "I think he wanted to."

Malik paled visibly and took a small step backwards.

"He wouldn't do that…" he protested.

"Not to anyone else, probably," Bakura agreed. "But when he looked at me…the hate in his eyes was the same hate I feel for the damn _Pharaoh_. And, as we know, _that's _lasted five thousand years and counting."

Malik gave a deep sigh.

"What a mess we've all made for ourselves…" he said tiredly, running a hand through his sandy hair.

"What do you think I'm supposed to do?" Bakura asked dully, slouching forward until his forearms rested on his knees.

"No idea. You don't care what I think, anyway," Malik said with another shrug. "But if it _is _something to do with Ryou…Unless you decide you regret what you did to him and want to help him – and _not _for selfish reasons – then I'd ask you just to leave him alone. You'll only hurt him more otherwise."

Bakura stared sullenly at the opposite wall, silent again.

"I'm going to bed now," Malik said with a yawn. "There's bedding and stuff in that cupboard."

The white-haired yami gave a barely discernible nod.

"Get some sleep. Don't sit up _all _night thinking about this."

Bakura scowled at him for daring to suggest that he would do something so stupid, but Malik was already gone. He exhaled noisily in irritation and frustration and leaned back into the sofa, glowering at the ceiling.

In truth, Bakura had never really gone out of his way to hurt Ryou. He hadn't particularly cared if he _did, _but he'd never made any special effort to do so. In fact, the amount of times he'd gone to his light's defence for his own amusement – sealing away the souls of his bullies, etc – probably vastly outnumbered the times he'd actually gone to him with the sole intention of causing him harm. For the most part he'd just completely disregarded his innocent host. To him, Ryou had always just been a means to an end. He had been a 'thing' for him to use and manipulate for his own purposes. His 'vessel'. And if his vessel was damaged while he tried to achieve his goals, then so be it. His destiny had been a higher one than that of the silly little mortal.

"_I could kill you right now. I could hurt you like you hurt me."_

Bakura raised a hand to his still-throbbing head. When he thought of Ryou's demeanour – so utterly opposed to the gentle, naïve nature he remembered – and the pure, raw anger and hate in those previously soft doe eyes, he got an almost nauseous feeling in the pit of his stomach.

He had been genuine, though, when he said he didn't care. He wasn't an empathetic being; to him, emotions were weak, and those who let themselves be ruled by them were fools. If Ryou was suffering – as a direct consequence of something he'd done or otherwise – it wasn't going to affect _him _in any way. He didn't even need the boy anymore.

However…

He shifted uncomfortably. He didn't know why, but he couldn't help but feel that he – _he, _the King of Thieves – had had something extremely precious stolen from right under his nose, purely because he'd never bothered taking care of it.

* * *

_**And thus chapter 2 ends.**_

**_Thanks to everyone who reviewed the pilot chapter :) It meant a lot to me. So that's follow-the-light-review, LonelyLostAngel, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, Ayame Irina, Destiny Quill, ONIX-21, AnimeLoverAngel, mystralwind and Echo in the Dark. You guys are awesome with a capital aw._**

**_Review?_**

**_Fiver x_**


	3. Start of the Breakdown

_**Chapter 3:**__** Start of the Breakdown**_

_The man's face w__as a mask of anguish as he stared at the boy who was not his son._

"_Ryou, I don't think you understand," he said, clearly doing his very best to stay calm. "There's been a terrible accident. Your mother and Amane…they…they're both dead."_

_An icy blade sliced straight through my heart at those words, and the world seemed to blur and fade._

_Dead? Mother,__ Amane? My little sister, always brimming and bubbling with light and life, was dead? __**Dead?**_

_I wanted to scream, but I had no voice. I wanted to fall to my knees and pound the floor until my fists bled, but I couldn't move._

"_Ryou…" the man said pleadingly._

"_What?" the boy who wasn't me snapped. "What do you want me to do about it?"_

_I moaned silently to myself. No, please, don't do this now…_

_Father's face twisted into a look of utter rage._

_"Is that all you have to say__?" he roar__ed, tears of grief escaping his eyes. "Your own mother and sister are __**dead, **__and you don't even care? When did you become so callous, Ryou? When did you change and become so __**heartless?"**_

_I started to cry. The tears weren't real, because I wasn't real, but I cried, the sheer awfulness of the moment overcoming me. I ached inside at the news of my loved ones' deaths, but th__e pain was distant. I was only spirit right now, a scrap of consciousness. Proper feeling was beyond me._

_The boy with my face laughed harshly and coldly._

"_Of course I don't care, you fool," he said, folding his arms and smirking sardonically. "They were nothing to me. Why __**would **__I care?"_

"_Have you gone mad?" Father said, looking afraid as well as angry now. "Ryou, what's __**wrong **__with you?"_

_The not-me only laughed again, head thrown back, as if father's confusion and fury were __**funny. **_

_I could understand why __Bakura might find it so amusing. He was twisted, for one thing. But also…here was __**my **__father, begging a complete stranger to care for __**my **__family. If __**he **__cared so much, why couldn't he see that the boy who laughed in his face was not Ryou? How could he even __**think **__that Ryou would act in such a way? Couldn't he tell his own son from the demon that faced him now?_

_Father's face coloured in fury at being mocked like this, and he lashed out with his right arm, the back of his hand smacking the not-me sharply across the face._

_Even in my spirit form, I froze and stared wide-eyed. My link to my body meant I could still feel the slightest little fragment of the blow. And it stung. It stung __**inside. **__Not even as a child, when I had misbehaved or committed some misdemeanour, had I been slapped like that. Neither of my parents had __**ever **__raised a hand to me in that manner._

_But he – the puppet-master operating my marionette-like body – only smiled wider. The slap had forced his head – __**my **__head – to one side, but still he smiled. It was a smile full of cruel satisfaction. He exalted in father's loss of control, and loved the fact that he had caused it. He __**wanted **__to make his pain worse._

_I started my ethereal crying again, unable to contain the shuddering sobs even though no one else could hear them. Why did he have to do this to me? Why does Bakura hate me so much? I let him have his way in almost everything. I let him have complete control of my body even though he has no right to it - I stand back and let him do terrible things. I watch with horror or turn away in guilt and revulsion while he uses my form to torture other, sometimes innocent, people. The screams of those who had their souls ripped from their bodies and forced into lead figures still haunt my dreams, but I never tried to stop Bakura from doing it. When he is in control, like now, he suppresses me completely (or he thinks he does – he probably isn't aware that I hover at his shoulder and watch his misdeeds) so maybe I could never have stopped him, but I never tried. I never put up much of a fight._

_Why?_

_Because…_

_Because I didn't want Bakura to hate me._

_I was__ always a lonely child. Without being self-pitying, I can honestly say I grew up largely friendless. I was constantly moved from place to place with father's work, and never had the confidence and charisma to integrate myself into new groups. I finally found comrades in the form of Yuugi and the others, but…they were all friends long before I came along. The bonds between them were stronger, and I would never be able to break into that close-knit structure of friendship. I could talk to them, I could be with them…but I'd never be __**one of them.**_

_So when I__ received the Millennium Ring and discovered the strong and intriguing, if dark and sadistic, personality within it, I was afraid – who wouldn't be? – but also…happy. Happy that at last there was someone who actually __**needed **__me. Only as a doll, of course, only as a body for him to control. But he still needed me. And I didn't have to be alone anymore._

_And really…the only__ thing I'd really hoped for since then was Bakura's approval. A smile, a few kind words…that would have been enough. I knew we could never co-exist in the same way Yuugi and his yami did, but…but…_

_All I__ ever wanted was to be his __**friend.**_

_The ancient spirit was full of anger, spite and malice, but deep down I felt like maybe he was just as alone as me._

_Wouldn't__ the time that fate had decided we had to spend together pass a lot more easily if we could help each other…?_

_But, no. Bakura hates me. He hates me as if I were some disgusting, wriggling worm. And I don't know why._

"_You are not my son," father said shakily._

_I blinked and looked up at him, unseen, hardly daring to believe it. Had he realised?_

"_I mean it, Ryou," he said, voice steadier now. "From this day forward, you are no child of mine. We are unrelated. We are strangers. I don't want to see you again."_

_I felt my own ghostly form go completely numb._

_**No.**_

_Bakura looked at him coldly._

"_That's fine," he said.__ "Your son never came first to you, anyway. Go back to your __**woman. **__At least I'm not putting up any pretence of grief. You've been sleeping with this new woman since __**long **__before your wife died. Don't pretend you care."_

_My mind spu__n. Father had been seeing another woman? Since when? And how would Bakura know about it?_

_If father noticed or was confused by his words – 'your son' instead of 'I', 'your wife' instead of 'mother' – or by the fact that he spoke about things I couldn't possibly know about, he didn't show it. He was completely overcome by rage._

"_I'm disowning you," he said flatly, opening the door. "I'm denying you completely."_

_**No! You're all I have left! I need you! **__**Please don't leave me!**_

_I wanted to run to him and throw myself into his arms, like when I was small, and cling to him and cry and say I was sorry. I wanted to tell him the whole truth about the Millennium Ring he had given me, and make him understand why I, quite literally, wasn't always myself. I wanted to tell him I cared._

_But all I could do was watch, an invisible wraith, as he threw Bakura one last look of disgust before walking out of my life forever._

_The slamming of the door echoed around my apartment._

_Then there was silence._

_Time seemed to stand still. I stood, or floated, dazed. Had that really just happened? Had it been a dream-?_

_Then, suddenly, Bakura decided to retreat to his soul-room. There was a glow of gold light from the Ring, and then I was thrust back into my body._

_And it was __**agony.**_

_My head swam.__ I swayed and fell to my knees._

_It hurt so much more now that I was a physical being again…! I had a heart to ache and eyes to cry and the bruised, stinging remnants of that slap on my face-_

_Amane was dead. Mother was dead. Father was gone._

_Dead, dead, gone. Dead and gone._

_The numbness of shock started to steal over me. Before it could claim me completely, the pain inside reached a shocking, stabbing climax._

_My whole family was __**gone**__. Just like that. __**Gone.**_

_I had my hands on either side of my head, and a scream tore out of me, and it was like no sound I'd ever made before. It was raw and burning, the howl of some dying animal, and it was ripped from my lungs against my own will. I __couldn't stop it. It hurt __**so much…!**_

_Why, Bakura?__What did I ever do to you?_

_**Why did you do this to me-?**_

_**

* * *

**_

His mind wrenched itself from sleep as the dream became too much to bear.

He stared around him, disorientated, lying on his back with his forehead beaded with cold sweat. His heart thumped against his ribcage, as if it were trying to escape.

Such horrible memories…

He sat up, feeling highly confused.

Wait.

He looked around the room, his eyes struggling to adjust to the tiny amount of light filtering through the blinds on the window.

Where…?

It was then that Malik emerged from the nearby bedroom.

"Morning, Bakura," he said with a yawn, heading into the bathroom.

* * *

"I think it's this way…"

"…"

"I _swear _it's around here somewhere…"

"…"

"It should be…right over here…"

"You don't seem terribly familiar with this place, aibou," Atemu remarked as they traipsed down yet another narrow, heavily vandalised street.

"It's the south side," Yuugi muttered. "I make a point of avoiding familiarity with it."

"I thought you'd at least know where Ryou's apartment is."

"I'll know it when I see it. I don't visit very often."

"But he's your friend!"

"Things have _changed_, Atemu," Yuugi said with a rueful sigh. "Ryou prefers to keep people at a distance. Even us."

They walked on a little way in silence, passing chain-link fences, smashed-up bus stops and boarded-up windows.

"Yuugi, this is _awful_," Atemu said in near-horror. "Why on earth does Ryou have to live here?"

"Long story…" he mumbled.

The people here looked as washed-out and broken as their surroundings. Teenagers skulked on street corners, dressed in uniform hoodies and sharing cigarettes. Women went along with shopping bags, never once taking their eyes off the sidewalk, or stood talking in doorways, some swigging from bottles even though it was before noon. Some men just stood. At windows, in the middle of the pavement. Just stood. Dozens of listless eyes stared but didn't see. It was a dead place.

"There are no palaces around here, Atemu," Yuugi said softly, noting the Pharaoh's stricken expression. Atemu was about to protest when they rounded a corner and, as their luck would have it, walked almost smack into two thick-set youths. They both had arrogant, swaggering gaits and more tattoos than bare skin. One had a nasty-looking pit-bull terrier on a leash. Both parties halted in surprise for a few seconds. Then the two youths looked up at them, dead eyes lighting up ever so slightly.

"Alright, _gentlemen_?" one sneered. "Watch your step, huh?"

It never ceased to amaze Atemu how certain underprivileged individuals could identify a more fortunate person a mile off. But then, even though he and Yuugi didn't have signs around their necks declaring them to be from a wealthy area – which they _weren't, _they just lived in a _normal _area – he supposed their aimless wandering made it clear that they weren't from around here.

"Excuse us. Come on, aibou," he said quietly, taking Yuugi's arm and making to walk past them.

"Hey, what's the hurry?" the second one asked, stepping in their way. "Go on, can't you spare some change for us lowlifes?"

"I-I don't have any money…" Yuugi stammered.

They had blocked their way now, and Atemu knew if they weren't careful they'd back them into the nearby alleyway, and anything could happen in there.

"Aw, come on, you richies _always _have money," the pit-bull owner drawled with a smile distinctly lacking in teeth.

"N-no…"

"You see my buddy here?" he went on, indicating to the monstrous-looking dog. "He don't like liars. He can sniff 'em out. And if he smells bullshit, people get _hurt._"

The street had suddenly gone very quiet. Atemu realised every pair of eyes was fixed on them. No one made any move to come to their assistance or the assistance of the two young thugs. But they watched. Unmoving, unspeaking. They watched, waiting for another scrap of proof of how low this place really was.

"We don't have any money," Atemu said coldly, ignoring his feeling of slight disquiet with all those languid eyes on him. "We're just here to visit a friend. So perhaps you could be kind enough to let us pass."

The two gawped at him for a moment and then started laughing noisily.

"Listen to him!" one barked. "Talks like a fuckin' king!"

"Yeah," the other said. "A _rich _king, right?"

They advanced towards them with greedy smiles. The dog barked and drooled excitedly. Yuugi backed away instinctively, but Atemu stood his ground, fully ready to make use of any Shadow Magic he still had left in him.

Fortunately, he didn't have to find out just how much Shadow Magic that was.

"Hey. Do you vultures need help _leaving?_"

They all froze at the voice, which came from behind Yuugi and Atemu. Everyone on the street immediately went back to what they had been doing, apparently trying to appear as if they hadn't just been sitting by and observing the proceedings without pity. The two thugs scowled but retreated hastily, hurrying around the nearest corner and out of sight.

They turned to face their rescuer. Atemu's look darkened as he got the feeling that their situation had just gone from bad to worse.

The guy standing at their backs was well over six feet tall. He wasn't as heavy-built as the two he'd chased off, but he had muscles, probably more than Atemu and Yuugi combined. He wore a black sleeveless hoodie – the sleeves appeared to have been torn off – and badly ripped jeans. There was a silver hoop through his lower lip and black, snake-like tattoos up his bare arms. His head was covered by a brimmed cap, with shocks of messy dark hair sticking out from underneath.

"Hey," he said again, his muddy green-brown eyes peering at them in turn. "What's a couple of high-class north-siders like yourselves doin' all the way down here?"

"We're lost…" Yuugi mumbled.

"Yeah, no shit_. _Where you headed?"

"We're visiting a friend," Atemu said warily.

"Buddy, that don't tell me a lot," the man said, folding his arms. "Where does your friend _live_?"

"We can find it on our own," Atemu said with a frown, taking Yuugi's arm again and starting to walk away.

"Sure you can," the man said in obvious amusement. "But if it's here in the shitty south, I'll take you there, just to make sure you don't get mugged along the way. Or I'll escort you back to nice-town. Whatever."

Atemu paused and looked at him suspiciously.

"I might look the part, but I ain't one of the bad guys," the man laughed. "So relax. Where does your friend stay?"

"…I don't actually know the name of the place," Yuugi confessed.

"_That's _a lot of help," he said, rolling his eyes. "What were you gonna do, just wander around this rat's nest all day? You nuts? Come on, just let me take you back up north-side…"

"Our friend's name is Ryou Bakura," Atemu said wearily. "Does that help in any way?"

To their great surprise, it did.

"What? You're Ryou's friends?" the man questioned, gaping. "Aw, shit-damn, why didn't I guess? He's the only one round here who'd have friends from the decent side of town."

"You know him?" Yuugi asked, astonished.

"Yeah, from work. He's a tough kid now, but he wasn't too streetwise when he first showed up here, y'know? I was always keeping an eye out for him. Still do," he grinned and extended a hand. "Kazuma Aso. Nice to meetcha. You're…Yuugi, right?"

"Yes," Yuugi said, blinking. "How did you…?"

"Ryou talks about you sometimes," Kazuma said by way of explanation. "Only after he's got a few drinks down him, I confess, but, y'know, that's the only time he talks much about anything."

"He drinks?" Atemu questioned, mildly appalled.

"What nineteen year-old doesn't? Not much, though. Hardly ever, actually. Shame. I bet he'd be a riot, drunk."

Atemu was somewhat comforted by this, but was still far from being at ease. Kazuma looked at him closely.

"And you're…" he said with a thoughtful frown. "Damn, what is your name, man? Akina, Atema…?"

"Atemu."

"That's the one. Yeah, I guess you didn't know Ryou so well? He forgets your name sometimes, when he's talking. Calls you 'the other Yuugi'. I didn't know what the hell he was talking about, but I get it now. You two do look pretty alike."

They exchanged looks with small, furtive smiles when he wasn't looking.

"Anyway, come on, I'll take you to his crib. It ain't far off," Kazuma said, gesturing for them to follow.

"Th-thank you…" Yuugi said. "Um, sorry…you said you know Ryou from work?"

"That's right."

"If you don't mind me asking…where _does _Ryou work?"

"Man, have you been outta town for a while or something?" Kazuma asked, peering at him out of the corner of his eye. "If he's your friend, you don't seem to know a lot about him."

Yuugi looked away guiltily.

"We've…been out of touch…" he mumbled.

"Whatever," Kazuma said with a shrug. "We both work at a joint not far from here. Angels' Lot. Pft, some name, huh? It's got a bar, restaurant, dancers…the works."

"…Dancers?" Atemu questioned.

Kazuma nodded.

"And…do these dancers…?" he started with trepidation.

"Take their clothes off?" Kazuma finished bluntly. "Nah. Not that it would make a lot of difference if they did – they don't wear much to start with. But it ain't a strip-club or a brothel or anything."

"Are they…male or female?"

"Depends on the night, really. We take all types."

"And…and Ryou…"

"Yeah. He's our star attraction."

"_Eh?"_

Yuugi and Atemu yelped in unison and stared at him, eyes bulging and mouths hanging open. He burst out laughing.

"Aw man, your _faces_!" he guffawed. "No, no, I'm totally kidding. Come on, you knowRyou would never do that. Doesn't go near the stage. More than a few customers have told me they'd _like _to see him on the stage, but he wouldn't set foot up there for a billion dollars. Prefers the shadows, y'know?"

They nodded dumbly, still shaken by his little joke.

"By the way…has something happened?" Kazuma asked, suddenly serious. "As much as Ryou's told me about you guys, I've never seen you around, and he always talks like he hasn't seen you in a long while. And something had him spooked last night, too. Normally him and the other kids rotate jobs through the evening: washing up, waiter duty, working at the bar, stuff like that. I ended up having to just send him to work in the back for his whole shift, cos every time anyone came in the front door he just about had a heart attack."

Yuugi and Atemu looked at each other uneasily.

"No, nothing's happened," Yuugi said with an attempt at a smile. "Not that we know of, anyway. We just thought we should come and see him."

"Hn…" Kazuma said, clearly unconvinced. "Well, good. I think he gets pretty lonely, living here. I mean, yeah, me and him get on ok, but we're kinda too _different _to really be friends. I'm sure you noticed that."

They laughed awkwardly.

Atemu silently wondered, not for the first time, _how _all this had happened, and why Yuugi and his friends had been unable or unwilling to stop it. He hadn't known Ryou terribly well – most of the times he'd seen him, his dark half had been in control – but he'd always been quite fond of him, and he didn't want any innocents to suffer for his and Bakura's age-long battle.

"There it is," Kazuma said as they approached a grimy, dull grey tower-block. "The prince's castle. You guys know which apartment it is?"

"Yes," Yuugi said, sounding highly relieved to see something familiar. "Thank you."

"No problem," he said. "But do me a favour, huh?"

"What's that?"

"I know Ryou's a stubborn little guy, but you're his friends so he should listen to you, right?"

"Theoretically…"

"Then tell him to get himself out of here," Kazuma said shortly. "And if he won't, you guys get him out of here. He's too good for this dump."

He turned and walked away before they even had a chance to reply. They stared at his retreating back dubiously until he was gone.

"It seems Ryou is quite highly thought of," Atemu commented.

"Looks that way."

"…You _do _know which apartment it is, don't you?" Atemu asked at length.

"Yes," Yuugi said, rolling his eyes.

"Just making sure."

They paused at the entrance. There was an intercom, but the door was hanging off its hinges.

"Aibou…do you think…?"

"Bakura?" Yuugi finished, amethyst eyes wide.

Without another word they darted inside. Yuugi led the way up the narrow, dark stairs, stopping suddenly on the second floor landing.

"Everything looks…ok up here…" he said, but he still sounded nervous.

"Come on, Yuugi," Atemu said, giving him a gentle push in the direction of the door before them (which, thankfully, was still in one piece and appeared to be securely on its hinges).

Yuugi reached out with a slightly unsteady hand and rang the doorbell. It trilled loudly through the apartment and the landing and echoed for a few seconds, and then there was a long pause of deathly silence that seemed to spiral on for eternity.

Then, suddenly, a voice came from the other side of the door.

"Who's there?" it asked. It was a familiar voice. It was laced with suspicion and apprehension, but it was a familiar, well-known voice. Yuugi relaxed and gave a small smile.

"A few old friends," he replied.

There was another pause and then they heard the lock click open. The door opened, but only a fraction. The chain was still on, and one brown eye peered out at them through the open gap. It recognised them and softened slightly, and a moment later the door swung open.

"I wondered when I'd be seeing you two," Ryou said, motioning for them to enter.

* * *

_**End chapter.**_

_**Oh look, it's starting to get weird-!**_

_**A huge thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter: Ayame Irina, ONIX-21, Niilan, AnimeLoverAngel, Twilight-Imp-626, Hikaru H.K, leer, Amethyst Underworld, Schizo-of-Destiny, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, CoCoBookmark, Thief Mistress Thorn and t recorder. You make this worth my time :]**_

_**Review?**_

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	4. Whatever's Left

_**Chapter 4:**__** Whatever's Left**_

At first glance, Atemu couldn't see the drastic change in Ryou that Yuugi had warned him of. The only real difference he noticed was that he looked _tired_ – not as if he'd merely slept badly the previous night, but as if the world had ground him down bit by bit over the past few years, and he was just plain exhausted with it. It was a permanent, bone-deep tiredness that lingered around his pale face, weary brown eyes and thin willowy frame.

That was by no means good, but Atemu had feared worse. He had feared he would be mad or violent, or have developed that same streak of cruelty so infamous of his darker half.

"It's nice to see you again, Ryou," he said as they stepped inside. The teen gave a somewhat pallid smile and shut the door with more force than necessary. Atemu couldn't help but suspect the feeling wasn't exactly mutual.

"It has been a long time," Ryou said politely. "Sorry about that unfriendly greeting. I've learned that I can't be too careful about opening my door."

"You don't seem too surprised to see old Pharaoh Atemu again," Yuugi commented with a small laugh, not acknowledging the rather morbid apology in any way.

"I'm not, really. The only reason you would come here would be if he were back," Ryou said with a shrug. "After all, it's not often I get visitors down here in Scumsville."

Yuugi flushed a deep red and frantically muttered some excuse and apology.

"It's alright," Ryou told him, leading them into the living room. "Don't worry about it. I'd stay as far away from this place as possible, if I didn't live here."

He'd obviously meant to say it jokingly, but it just sounded hollow, and something in his look was sad. Lonely, Atemu realised, remembering what Kazuma had said.

The room was a combined living room and bedroom – in the centre there was a sofa, table and television, and pushed into a corner was a bed, next to which there was a small chest of drawers. In another corner there was a narrow writing desk and a chair. Ryou had evidently done the best he could with a very small budget. Most of the cracked, cheap laminate flooring was hidden by a large rug, and the sofa was covered by a colourful throw, concealing any stains or thread-bareness. The walls were painted a muted, neutral beige and were dotted with a few pictures and prints. No photographs, Atemu noticed, and that made it a little cold and impersonal. However, the overall effect was…normal. It looked like any other apartment belonging to a young person a little short on cash. If you closed the curtains to obscure the ghastly view of South Domino, it could have been anywhere. It could have been an apartment in a pleasant place.

"Anyway…" Ryou continued suddenly, "I knew you had to be back, Pharaoh, because…well. If one spirit were back, it made sense that the others would be back too."

Atemu's blood ran cold as he realised they were too late.

"Bakura has been here?" he asked, anxiously looking the boy over for any injuries. "You've seen him?"

"He was here yesterday, yes," Ryou said stiffly. "Would you like something to drink? I don't know if I have any tea."

He wandered out of the room, presumably towards the kitchen. Atemu stared after him, bewildered. Yuugi looked at him as if to say 'See?'

The Pharaoh followed the teen, Yuugi right behind him, looking resigned.

"Ryou, wait," Atemu said, stopping him with a hand on his shoulder. "You say he came here? He found you? What happened?"

Ryou shrugged his hand off and continued searching through the few kitchen cupboards.

"Let's just say he got a traditional south-side welcome and leave it at that," he said, chocolate-coloured eyes trained firmly on the contents of the latest cupboard. Atemu looked confusedly towards Yuugi, who sighed.

"Baseball bat, Ryou?" he asked softly.

"I'm afraid so," he said distantly. "He snuck in. He must have picked the lock. I've been careless recently…I hadn't put the chain on. I just did what I've learned to do when I hear someone in my apartment."

"…Oh," Yuugi said, wincing. Atemu still didn't know what they were talking about.

"Yes…" Ryou said. "Is coffee ok? I think it's all I have."

"What did you do when you realised it was him?" Yuugi asked. Ryou started spooning instant coffee into mugs even though his question had been ignored.

"Well, I…" he hesitated. "I hit him again."

Yuugi covered his face with one hand, to hide either shock or laughter. Atemu still looked a little lost, but comprehension was clearly beginning to dawn on him because his eyes had gone rather wide.

"It was his own fault, really…" Ryou said vaguely, filling the kettle and switching it on. "If he'd knocked, I would only have hit him once…probably."

"…I don't understand," Atemu said at length.

"It's probably better that way," Ryou said with a faint smile.

"Where…where is Bakura now?" the Pharaoh asked, letting the matter drop.

"I don't know," Ryou told him bluntly.

"Is he coming back here?"

"I doubt it."

"Did he say where he was-?"

"_No,_" Ryou said with a strange, cold anger flaring up behind his eyes. "I don't know anything. He came here, and he didn't find what he was looking for. So he left. And I don't know or care where he's gone. If that's the only reason you came here, you might as well _leave._"

Atemu was taken-aback.

'_You understand now?' _Yuugi asked across their link, _'He's…different.'_

Atemu didn't reply. He was remembering what Anzu had said yesterday: that Ryou was angry about what had happened to him.

He could see it now. That anger did indeed exist – anger that could easily be justified, anger at suffering things he never should have suffered – and a good part of it had evolved into hatred. Hatred for Bakura, primarily, but some of it, Atemu realised with a great sadness, was directed at _him. _He'd never done anything directly to Ryou, but he'd been one of the main reasons for Bakura's revival from within the Millennium Ring. Of course Ryou would blame him, in part.

"Ryou…" he said sadly, reaching out to him.

"Don't look at me like that," the pale teen said quietly, stepping away.

"We can help you," Atemu said earnestly. "You don't have to live like this."

"What's wrong with the way I live?" Ryou challenged heatedly. "I take care of myself. I don't need to rely on anyone. Do you do that?"

"But this place…"

"It's the best I can afford," the white-haired teen said fiercely. "Don't look down on me, or pity me. I'm not the only one. A lot of people aren't as fortunate as…as others."

Atemu knew he had been about to say 'as you'.

Ryou drew in a deep breath and seemed to collect himself.

"Yuugi," he said brightly, as if that had never happened. "Don't you have college this afternoon?"

"Oh, yes!" Yuugi gasped as he remembered, looking at his watch. "In a few hours, actually. Sorry, we'd better go…"

"That's alright," Ryou said with a ghostly smile.

Atemu noticed that his smile never really reached his eyes anymore.

The kettle finally finished boiling, but they were already saying their goodbyes at the door.

"Look after yourself, Ryou," Yuugi said as he stood in the doorway.

Ryou nodded. Yuugi looked like he wanted to hug him or make some such friendly gesture, but in the end just waved a hand awkwardly.

"Here…" Ryou said, scribbling something down on a scrap piece of paper and handing it to him, "That's my cell number, so next time you can just call. There's no need for you to come all the way down to this place."

"But-"

"Bye, Yuugi," he said with another empty smile.

Yuugi gave a resigned sigh and nodded before going out the door. Atemu lingered a moment, feeling he should say something, do something.

Ryou caught him with those deep brown eyes – eyes the Pharaoh remembered always being so open and full of life, now guarded, distant and just plain tired.

"Goodbye, Pharaoh," he said.

"It'll be alright, Ryou," he replied with a small, reassuring smile.

He didn't know why he said it. It seemed more appropriate than 'goodbye'.

As he turned to follow Yuugi, he didn't see Ryou's bemused expression. The last thing he saw before leaving the tiny apartment was a baseball bat propped up against the wall next to the door, and for some reason it made him want to cry.

* * *

"Malik."

The sandy-blond blinked and looked up at the summons. Bakura stood in the doorway, half-slouched against the doorframe.

"Yeah?" Malik said, sitting up straight and stretching, trying to ease the dull ache in his back. Sitting hunched over your psych textbook for three hours was a real killer.

Bakura came inside – he'd been wandering in and out of the apartment agitatedly all day – and shut the door before taking the seat opposite him at the table.

"Since I'm back in this world and seem to be stuck here…" he said stiffly, pointedly not looking at him, "You might as well tell me what I've missed while I've been gone."

Malik suppressed a laugh. He knew exactly what Bakura wanted him to tell him but was too proud to ask. And he wasn't going to give it to him so easily.

"Sure," he said, closing his textbook. "What do you want to know? World events? Colloquial lingo?"

Bakura shot him a glare, knowing his game but giving in anyway.

"First of all, why is the brat living in the city's slimy underworld?" he asked unflinchingly.

"If by 'the brat', you mean Ryou, it's because he couldn't afford the rent for his old apartment," Malik replied simply with a shrug. "It was only after he moved to the south side that we found out how much he'd been struggling. If we'd known we would have helped. I said he could come stay here if he wanted, and Yuugi and his grandpa wanted him to move in with them for a while, but he refused. Turned away from all of us. He insisted he needed to stand on his own two feet…" He shook his head. "I understand what he meant, but I wish he didn't have to live in that place. It's so…sleazy."

"When was that?" Bakura questioned.

"Not long after you and Pharaoh floated off to spirit-land. He's lived in that hole more than two years now."

"Why could he suddenly not afford the rent?" Bakura asked, one eyebrow raised. "Did it go up?"

"No…" Malik said, frowning as he tried to think. "If I remember right, his father always paid part of the rent. One day he just stopped sending Ryou money. Ryou never told us why."

He saw a mildly disturbed expression cross Bakura's face and wondered why. The yami had been acting oddly edgy all day, as if something was preying on his mind.

"Anything other questions?" Malik asked. Bakura sighed irritably.

"Just tell me about the brat," he said sourly. "Since you're so sure I can't be rid of him yet."

"You can be 'rid of him' if you like," Malik said with a scathing glower. "Like I said, only help him if you really _want _to. You can't half-ass this, Bakura. If you're not willing to be part of his life – helping him, fixing everything you wrecked, showing him a little respect – then do us all a favour and stay away from him. It's bad enough for us, his friends, having to just stand by and watch him falling in this hole, without you going and making it worse."

Bakura narrowed his eyes and turned away.

"Since when did you care about him?" he muttered.

"Since I moved here and got to know him," Malik promptly replied. "It's too bad that you won't do the same."

"Do what?"

"Get to know him," Malik said with a slightly wistful smile. "If you did, I think you might actually like him, especially now he's toughened up a bit."

"Pft, _like _him? I think not," Bakura said, lip curling.

"You'd be surprised," Malik said with a smirk.

"Whatever," Bakura snapped. "Look, I don't know if I want to help him. Probably not. But if you'd just tell me what's happened in the three years I've been gone, it might help me make up my mind."

"Yeah, ok, keep your hair on," Malik said, rolling his eyes. "There's not a lot to tell, really. He didn't do as well at school as expected. He didn't get the grades he wanted and didn't get into college. So I think he pretty much works and studies round the clock now, so he can try again. I don't know if he wants to save up enough money to move to a better area first, though."

"Where does he work?" Bakura asked, not appearing to feel any pity at the events Malik had just listed. The blond paused for a moment, gaze shifting guiltily to the side, before answering.

"A place called 'Angels' Lot', somewhere in the south side," he said at length, eyes wandering over the tabletop.

"'Angels' Lot'?" Bakura repeated with slight disdain. "That sounds…wrong."

"Tell me about it."

"So what does he do there?"

"Don't get excited, he's not a pole dancer or a male prostitute or anything," Malik said with a mild warning glare. "As far as I know, he works as a waiter, or behind the bar. I think he has to 'entertain' certain customers sometimes, too, talking to them and stuff. Most of the slime-bags down there probably want more than just talking. But Ryou wouldn't let them touch him."

"Probably carries his baseball bat to work with him," Bakura said bitterly. Malik laughed.

"Is that what he got you with?" he asked.

"Yes," Bakura replied shortly, looking rather humiliated.

"I must commend his choice of weapon. Anyway, all that stuff has culminated in the Ryou you met yesterday."

"Is that everything?" Bakura asked, eyebrows raised. "I expected something distinctly more elaborate."

"No," Malik said a little too firmly, his eyes doing that uncomfortable, shifty thing again. "That's all. But believe me, Ryou hasn't changed as much as you think."

Bakura 'hmph'ed and turned away again.

"Suit yourself," Malik said amiably, getting to his feet. "I need to go, anyway. I have the afternoon shift at the game shop, then I have classes tonight. I won't be back until late. No wild parties while I'm gone, you hear me?"

This time it was Bakura's turn to roll his eyes.

"…Game shop?" he repeated suspiciously after a moment. "The one owned by the Pharaoh's light's family?"

"That one indeed."

"…Do _not _tell them I'm here," Bakura ordered. Malik laughed again.

"Alright, I won't embarrass you," he said. "It could be potentially catastrophic to let you and the Pharaoh get within speaking distance of each other. So I'll keep my mouth shut."

"You'd better," Bakura said, folding his arms moodily.

"While I'm away, you might want to think about what you're going to do with this 'new life' of yours," Malik suggested. "I can't imagine that you'd want to live in my poky little flat forever. Besides, it's only a matter of time before we start driving each other crazy and fighting like a married couple, if our past encounters are anything to go by."

"I don't know. You don't appear to be an unhinged, vengeful control-freak anymore."

"Maybe not, but you still are."

Bakura scowled at him. Malik bit his lip to keep from sniggering. Somehow, getting a rise out of the Thief was an endless source of entertainment for him.

"Here…" he said, extracting an object from a nearby drawer and pressing it into Bakura's hand. "A spare key. Don't lose it."

Bakura looked at the small silver key with a frown.

"Why are you trusting me with this, Malik?" he demanded, suspicious again. "Why are you helping me? You have no reason to care if I have a roof over my head or not. What's going on?"

"Nothing. Just…everyone needs a hand every now and then," the blond shrugged. "And why should I distrust you? You have nothing to gain by causing me trouble."

Bakura didn't look entirely convinced by his somewhat skewed logic. Malik tried to smile in a confidence-inducing fashion. The truth was, he wanted to help him because he'd seen what could happen to a person when they didn't get the help they needed in time. Ryou was being dragged down a dark path, and Malik would be damned if he'd let it happen to anyone else if it was within his power to stop it.

Of course, there were other considerations too. Malik hoped – fervently – that helping Bakura would, in turn, help Ryou, eventually. But telling the yami that probably wouldn't be a wise move.

"If you were Mariku it might be a different story," he said with a forced smile. Bakura studied him for a long moment.

"Do you hate him?" he asked finally. Malik blinked, taken-aback.

"…No," he replied at length. "I'm afraid of him. I won't deny that. But I don't hate him."

"Why?" Bakura asked, crimson eyes seeming to peer right through him. "Why do you choose fear? Why don't you hate him, the way Ryou hates me?"

"Because…" Malik said slowly, "He's really…part of me, right? He's not a spirit like you or Pharaoh. I created him, as another personality to deal with the situations I didn't want to deal with. He got out of control…but it was as much my fault as his. That whole situation got out of my control. And I know he did terrible things, but…he was born out of my anger and pain. How could he be expected to be anything besides evil? I made him as my _vent _for all the bad feelings inside me. As a sort of dark shadow of myself. Ryou never asked to have anything to do with you, but I created Mariku myself. So, you see, I fear him because he's the part of me I have no control over. I fear him, and maybe I pity him. But I could never hate him."

Bakura looked at him gravely.

"You have a strange way of looking at things," he said. "Maybe you made him, but he's still a separate person with a separate mind. If I were you, I'd probably hate him."

"You probably would," Malik agreed. "But you hate most things."

Bakura's mouth twisted into a thin, dry smile.

"That's true," he conceded.

"Anyway, you've kept me talking way too long," Malik announced, looking at his watch. "I'm going to be late if I don't run. If you need to cook anything while I'm away, _please _don't set the place on fire."

"Go, Malik," Bakura growled.

"Bye," he said with a faux-sweet grin, shoving everything he needed in his messenger bag and dashing off to the Kame Game Shop.

The apartment seemed very empty and quiet when he was gone.

Bakura let out a groan and let his already bruised head fall onto the table. Gods. He really _had _screwed up Ryou's life. That little exchange between him and his father had had dire consequences.

He growled quietly. Before that bizarre and unnerving dream last night, he'd almost forgotten about that day entirely, so unimportant had it seemed. In all honesty, he hadn't at first recognised the man raving about his dead wife and daughter as Ryou's father. It had only been when he'd said 'your mother and Amane…' that he'd started to wonder, and he'd only known for sure when he'd declared 'he' was no longer his son. And then he'd just been pissed off. The man was a hypocrite. He was ranting about how Ryou should care about his family, and yet he couldn't even see that the person he was shouting at wasn't Ryou. He was proclaiming his grief for his dead wife, and yet there was another woman waiting for him in the car outside. He'd seen the man with that woman often around town, and he could tell they were more than just good friends. And while he sent Ryou enough money to keep him alive, he never actually came to see him. He rarely phoned him or checked up on him – he didn't really seem to care what happened to him at all. So what right did he have to come barging in and making judgements?

Bakura smirked humourlessly to himself. He supposed he'd been trying to show Ryou that his father wasn't the great man he believed him to be.

It was true…he really _had _gone violently to his host's defence more often than he'd tried to hurt him.

Unfortunately, it seemed like his defensive actions just made things worse. Damn, how come his schemes to _deliberately _do evil had never been as successful as this? There had always been some annoying do-gooder around to foil him. Where had the annoying do-gooders been this time, when they might actually have been useful?

He wasn't overly concerned, though. He was, and always had been, the 'bad guy'. He'd spent most of his existence trying to cause suffering. So if he'd accidentally caused someone to suffer, it should be merely amusing to him. An 'added bonus'.

Right?

Right.

He shut his eyes. Still, experiencing that scene through Ryou's eyes – since he'd concluded that that had been the nature and subject matter of his most unusual dream - had left him shaken. He'd never known what height and intensity of emotion his light was capable of. It had only been a dream, but his grief at the loss of his mother and sister had given him _physical pain. _

And that scream…

Bakura shuddered slightly despite himself. At the actual time of the event, he'd been within the Millennium Ring, and so had been deaf to that terrible sound. But this time he'd heard it. This time he'd _made _it.

And he hated to admit it, but he knew that sound.

It was the sound his heart had made the night his family and friends were slaughtered, right before his very eyes.

* * *

"So did you see what we've been talking about?" Yuugi asked as he prepared to leave for college. "There's no need to worry about Ryou."

"Yuugi, how can you even _say _that?" Atemu sighed. "There's more reason to be worried about him than ever."

"Well…yeah. But I meant with regards to Bakura. I don't think you need to worry about him giving Ryou trouble."

"That's true…" Atemu said, but he still didn't sound happy. "But…how has he been allowed to fall so far? That terrible place…and working in some club…and he seemed so _different, _so distant and cold…"

"The complete opposite of before, right?" Yuugi finished. "I know. We all tried to help him – I think Malik _still _tries to help him – but he won't let us. I don't know why."

Atemu sighed.

"I think I do," he said sombrely.

"Really?" Yuugi said, curious. "Do tell."

"Think about it," the Pharaoh said. "What did Bakura always do to Ryou?"

Yuugi stared at him blankly.

"I never knew he did anything to him," he said. "I thought they didn't interact like-?"

"He _controlled _him, Yuugi," Atemu said. "You and I always had some level of co-existence. But Bakura always completely and forcefully controlled Ryou. When he took possession of his body, he suppressed his consciousness totally, and even if Ryou was in control physically, Bakura probably still held sway over him mentally. He controlled and dominated Ryou's whole life, through fear and manipulation."

"But…what does that mean?" Yuugi asked. "I know it must have been terrible, but why does all that…?"

"It means Ryou has a problem with control now," Atemu said. "It's perfectly understandable: after Bakura's completely ruling over him, he doesn't want anyone else to control him like that ever again. That's why he won't let anyone help him, why he has to be so self-sufficient. If you helped him, he'd be in your debt. And you'd have that…control over him."

Yuugi was wide-eyed.

"How do you work this stuff out?" he gaped. "All this time I thought…I don't even know what I thought."

"I could be wrong. That's just the way I see it. He wants to stand alone, to prove to himself that he's capable of doing so. And he's keeping you all at a distance because he doesn't want to let anyone get close enough to him to have an influence over him."

"Oh…how come I never notice these things until it's too late?" Yuugi groaned.

"It's not your fault, aibou," Atemu said with a reassuring smile. "If anyone is to blame, it's Bakura, and myself. I rather doubt Bakura will be interested in helping, but I'll do everything I can to repair the situation. Now, don't you have a lecture to get to?"

"Yeah," Yuugi said, returning the smile. "I'll see you when I get back, ok?"

"Do your best, Yuugi."

* * *

_**End chapter.**_

_**I should warn you all. This is going to be a long day in Homecoming!verse. A long, long day.**_

_**You know, I already regret giving the chapters names. It's so hard to find a good title for every single one.**_

_**A big thank-you to Niilan, ONIX-21, Ayame Irina, Thief Mistress Thorn, Hikaru H.K, Strange Liou, Daemon-In-White, AnimeLoverAngel, gothboymylove, leer, Schizo-of-Destiny, LittleGreenPuppy, vampirebabelover,**__** PharaohDeli, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix and Thief of Spades. You all keep me dancing through life :]**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	5. Who I Am Now

_**Chapter 5**__**: Who I Am Now**_

It was getting dark outside.

Bakura stared disdainfully down at the Domino streets from the front window of Malik's apartment. The people scurried about like brainless insects. Just waiting to be squashed.

He hadn't had the most productive day of his life. He'd gone out thieving shortly after Malik had left for work – some new clothes, some things that had just caught his eye. He reached into his pocket and fingered a deathly-sharp knife with an ornate handle. It had definitely caught his eye. He'd expected stealing to be a lot harder in this modern age, but it had been almost disappointingly simple. Technology may have advanced, but the people were as stupid as ever.

And then he'd tried, for no known reason, to locate his lighter half, using the connection they shared.

And it hadn't worked.

Scowling, he closed his eyes and tried again, searching for that invisible thread that linked his soul (did he have a soul?) to Ryou's.

It was there. But it was limp, unresponsive – not leading him anywhere.

How vexing.

He supposed he should be glad – by Malik's logic, if the connection wasn't there, he didn't have to bother with Ryou. But he wasn't glad. He was irritated. The thread was _there_, it just wasn't doing anything.

He let out a savage growl and stomped over to the magazine rack. He was aggravated and fidgety and he didn't know why, and that just made it worse.

He grabbed the telephone directory and started thumbing through it roughly, not caring when the thin pages tore. He didn't have any concrete plan in mind, but he knew that, somewhere in the course of the evening, he'd be going to Angels' Lot, and the chances were that he'd see Ryou.

But once again, he had no idea why.

Maybe it was because, insofar as he was aware, the only reason that a connection, such as the one he and his light shared, would cease to function was that one of the two connected things was no longer functioning either. As in, one end of the connection was dead. And it certainly wasn't him.

Or maybe he was just bored enough to wonder.

* * *

"Ryou. Hey, Ryou. Wake up, man."

The white-haired teen blinked and looked up to see Kazuma at his shoulder.

"Oh…sorry, I was daydreaming," he murmured, shaking his head to clear it and going back to washing the alarmingly large army of used glasses on the dresser.

"No kidding," Kazuma said in amusement, "You've been on a different planet since yesterday. What's up?"

"Nothing," Ryou lied. Kazuma didn't say anything for a moment, clearly expecting him to elaborate. When he, of course, didn't, the man sighed in annoyance and changed the subject.

"Were ya surprised to see your old buddies today? Wassit…Yuugi and Atemu?"

Ryou looked back up at him, frowning.

"How do you know about that?" he asked suspiciously.

"Hah, cos if it weren't for me, they prob'ly never would have made it to you," Kazuma laughed, "They got lost. I showed them the way."

"You should have sent them home," Ryou said severely, setting a newly-cleaned shot glass on the draining board so severely that it chipped, "What were you thinking, leading people like _them_ around _here_?"

"Yeah, yeah, I know," Kazuma said quickly, wincing at the glare he was receiving, "Normally I would have just carted them off home – you know that. But they said they were lookin' for you, and I figured ya could use some company. You looked like ya'd seen a ghost last night. Ya sure nothing's happened? Need me to rough someone up for ya?"

"Everything's fine," Ryou said shortly, forcing himself to reject any ideas of unleashing the fury of the south-side mob against his yami.

"Hn. As long as ya know the offer always stands. Anyway, listen up, man. I got some good news, and some bad news."

Ryou set down the wash rag and the latest tumbler and turned to him expectantly. Kazuma grinned.

"Good news is, your biggest fan is here," he said, just as the kitchen double doors burst open and a small girl with dark brown hair in two curly bunches came running in.

"Ryou," she said happily, almost tripping over her patent-leather-clad little feet as she ran straight to him. She stopped directly in front of him and held out her arms with an indignant pout. Ryou smiled – a proper smile, a rare thing these days – and scooped her up in his arms.

"Hello, Mio," he said, holding her so that their faces were level, "And how are you this fine night?"

"Your hands are all wet," she giggled and gave him a clumsy kiss on the cheek before hugging him tightly around the neck.

Kazuma was only twenty-two, but Mio was his five-year old daughter. Her mother worked some nights, and so did he, and when they couldn't find a babysitter he'd bring his little princess to work with him – to a low, crooked place with a never-ceasing flow of alcohol, dirty dancers and patrons who were some of the real scum of the earth. It was one of the many things Ryou had learned to accept as 'normal' these past few years.

Kazuma doted on her, though, and was determined that she'd have a better life than he'd had. She was due to start school soon, and she was enlisted at a good elementary school in the north side of the city. That was a good beginning.

"So what's the bad news?" Ryou asked suddenly, not feeling all that worried. Maybe one of the beer taps had broken, or the latest delivery of soda water hadn't come in, or something like that.

"Well, thing is…" Kazuma said slowly, grin looking decidedly forced now, "Your other 'biggest fan' is here too."

Ryou's face immediately fell. Mio, sensing something amiss, stopped laughing to herself and looked solemn, fidgeting slightly in his arms.

"…Do I have to?" the teen asked quietly, looking at the floor.

"He asked for you," Kazuma said apologetically, "And the customer gets what the customer wants. Come on, Ryou, it ain't so bad. You just gotta serve them their drinks, maybe talk to 'em a little. He likes you. He'll leave ya a big tip, he always does."

"I don't like the way he looks at me," Ryou whispered, flushing and looking off to the side.

"Be glad he's just looking for now," Kazuma told him, "Trust me, first sniff of trouble and I'm cracking skulls. But if he ain't done anything, I can't tell him 'no'."

"He…touches me," Ryou persisted, but his voice was becoming increasingly feeble.

"I know. I've seen it, man," Kazuma said, not meeting his eyes, "I know it's creepy. But he ain't done anything that's _so_ bad…by the standards here, I mean."

"I know…" the teen sighed in defeat before sitting Mio up on one of the worktops, "Sorry, Mio. Ryou has to go talk to the bad men. I'll come and see you when they go away, yeah?"

"O-kaay," she said, pouting again in disappointment, "You go beat up the bad guys."

"If only…" Ryou muttered as he strove to untie the white plastic apron he always had to wear when working in the kitchen. Underneath he was wearing a short-sleeved black-and-white checked shirt and a pair of form-fitting black skinny jeans. He was grudgingly aware that he was particularly 'slender' for a boy, and so knew that wearing such clothes was likely to catch people's attention. Make them stare. He didn't like it, but it sort of came with the job.

"I'd show a bit more bare skin if I were you," Kazuma commented, "Gotta keep 'em interested."

"What am I, a pin-up?" Ryou snapped bitterly, not loud enough for Mio to hear.

"No, you're a tease."

Ryou grumbled but reluctantly obliged, unfastening the bottom few buttons on his shirt and tying it at the front in a knot instead, so it finished a few inches above his navel.

"An _extreme _tease," Kazuma said, shaking his head, "Ryou, man, you could lead straight guys astray."

"Is that supposed to make me feel good about myself?"

"Here's their order," he said, handing him a slip of paper and ignoring the sour question, "Get to work, kiddo."

Ryou accepted the order slip, deliberately grimacing and holding it between thumb and forefinger as if it were something filthy, before proceeding to the bar. As soon as he emerged from the kitchen, he could feel eyes on him, countless men and women (but mostly _men, _not many women frequented _this _place) all staring at Angels' Lot's most curious enigma. He lowered his head. Their stares were always appreciative, but he hated them. In fact, it was _because _they were appreciative that he hated them. Their gazes were full of lust and lechery, two things he had always feared and abhorred. These were the kind of people he'd never imagined having to associate with, never mind serving them drinks and being humble and polite towards them, as if _encouraging _their crudeness.

He knew he was, by far, the most demure of the Lot's employees. The other young waiters and waitresses strutted around in increasingly scanty 'clothing', competing to acquire the most admirers and so make the most money. They sat on customers' laps, flattered them and batted their eyes, and blew them sly, suggestive kisses whenever they looked their way. They'd let these people do almost anything to them, if it meant they'd earn a bit more cash. Were they more desperate or just cruder…?

He, on the other hand, always kept largely covered up. He may have learned to wear clothes that would accentuate his appearance enough to keep people interested, but there were certain parts of his anatomy that he felt had no right to see the light of day. He'd serve people their orders, be civil enough, and could usually put on a fake smile, but did his best to avoid close contact with any of them. He knew what _that _could lead to. As a result, Kazuma wasn't the only one who called him a tease.

His 'colleagues' had often remarked – in between bitter, envious glares in his direction – that if he came in to work one night wearing hot-pants, a cute vest and eyeliner, and stopped being 'so goddamned frigid', he could have every customer, male and female, falling at his feet.

Well, maybe – though he wasn't sure if the idea of him dressed like that was nauseating or amusing. He didn't pay much attention personally, but people were constantly making complimentary – if lewd – comments about his looks. However. If he _was_ particularly 'pretty', the very thought of so brazenly exploiting his appearance to please these people made him shudder. He felt sick enough with himself, doing the little he did. He felt cheap. Like he _was _selling himself. He'd never done anything beyond making conversation, but he felt…disgusting. Like he'd traded all his morals away. When he was at work, his self-esteem was permanently at an all-time low.

He briskly shook himself out of this sad reverie. Thoughts like that were useless. Stupid. He had to do it, so he'd keep on doing it. He needed the money, and this was probably the best-paying job a nineteen year-old with crappy qualifications could get in the south side, besides _actually _being a prostitute. And he'd like to think he would never be reduced to _that._

His hands, moving in assured auto-pilot, finished pouring out the various drinks on his list. Silently bracing himself for what was inevitably to come, he placed all of the glasses onto a round tray and made his way, head held high and looking as aloof as he could, to the appropriate table.

"Aha," a man with slicked back peroxide-blonde hair said at his approach, with a grin that most definitely spoke of ill-intent, "Here's my icy little angel. I was getting worried, Ryou. I thought you were _avoiding _me."

"Your drink, Mr Sato," Ryou replied primly, setting the correct glass in front of him.

Takeshi Sato was a regular here. He was a young man – around twenty five – and he was wealthy, but had become so through unpleasant, underhanded means. Drug-dealing, black-market deals, that sort of thing. But despite all the disturbing rumours about him that were always circulating, most people around here, and quite a few from higher circles, thought him admirable – a fine example of how a man can work his way to the top no matter how modest his beginnings. Ryou knew better. Takeshi was the worst kind of man: one who acts only towards his own gain, without a thought about how those actions might inflict loss upon others. He was a mercenary who felt nothing but greed and cold-blooded ambition. And lust. A lot of that. And although he had all that money, he never spent it tastefully, or generously. He wasn't funding any of the anti-crime projects around here, or trying to help improve the place he grew up in. No. His ever-increasing fortune was spent on a huge, tacky house and a huge, tacky car and too many gaudy gold necklaces. He was almost worshipped around here, but Ryou despised him quietly. He distrusted him. He knew that a viper encrusted in diamonds was still a snake underneath, and it still had cruel fangs and deadly poison.

And so it was wholly unfortunate that Takeshi seemed to have made a proper favourite of him.

At his cool reply and ensuing silence, he laughed raucously.

"Ooh, someone's _particularly _cold tonight," he said as Ryou served the other drinks, "I always say the Lot doesn't need to put ice in their drinks. Just get Ryou to serve them."

His companions laughed as if that remark had been in any way remotely witty. The urge to make a cutting retort was almost overwhelming, but Ryou bit it back.

"Enjoy your drinks," he said quietly, making for a swift retreat. To his displeasure – but not really to his surprise – a hand shot out and grabbed his wrist, pulling him back.

"Hey, what's the hurry?" Takeshi crooned, "Stay and talk to me."

"There are other customers, Mr Sato," he said stiffly.

"Ah, your slutty little co-workers can deal with them," he said with a dismissive wave, "I'm the most important man in this place. I demand the best. And you're the best here, by far. We all know that."

Ryou didn't know what infuriated him more: the man's gross arrogance or the way he was blatantly and sleazily gazing at his exposed stomach with absolutely no trace of shame. He already regretted taking Kazuma's advice. With other customers, showing 'a bit more bare skin' would only increase his chance of a large tip. With Takeshi, it was likely only to cause trouble. His colleagues always told him he'd be more popular if he dressed and acted more like them. But with some of his 'admirers' – Takeshi being a prime example – he felt it was because he _didn't _act like the others that they liked him so much. They actually _liked _that he acted so aloof – maybe it made him seem 'classier'. And the fact that he wore clothes that covered most of him probably appealed to them in a weird way too – it left more to their dirty imaginations, and they could think longingly of what he was hiding away.

Basically, he was in a lose-lose situation.

Takeshi's hand still had a firm grip on his wrist. At length, when it became clear that Ryou had given up all hope of a quick escape, it trailed down to his hand, caressing the pale skin lightly.

There were no words to describe the utter revulsion that burned through Ryou. His one desperate wish was to snatch his arm away and smash the tray he still held over Takeshi's head. But he couldn't. He knew he couldn't. An animated, fiery reaction just made the idiot more keen. The only thing that seemed to in any way dampen his lecherous ardour was a silent, reproachful and, yes, _cold _response, though recently that seemed to be becoming a turn-on too.

So he stood perfectly still, looking at their entwined hands dispassionately with a faint expression of distaste, keeping his own hand as limp and unresponsive as a dead fish.

"Ooh, ouch," Takeshi said, feigning hurt, "That's mean, Ryou. You're so heartless."

He tensed at that word. Takeshi noticed.

"Uh-oh…" he said with a slow smirk, "Did I touch a nerve?"

Ryou cast his eyes downwards, struggling to keep his face neutral. Why that word? Of all the words in Takeshi's narrow vocabulary, why did he have to use the one that got to him so badly?

"Aw, I think I hurt your feelings," Takeshi said, pretending to be sad for a moment before grinning more sleazily than ever and hooking an arm around his waist, "Why don't you let me make it up to you?"

Ryou's skin crawled at the feeling of that arm and hand pressed against his bare back and abdomen.

"Excuse me," he said, wrenching himself free, grabbing the tray and almost running back to the bar. Behind him he could hear Takeshi laughing harshly.

"I'll break you down one of these days, Ryou!" he called after him, "Just you wait! One day you're gonna come to me begging for it!"

Ryou shuddered inwardly while trying desperately to look busy. His hands were trembling. He shook himself angrily, irritated that his mind couldn't overcome his body's natural weakness.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mio creep out of the kitchen and start wandering around searchingly. Guessing that she was looking for him, he made to go over to her, but was stopped by a meaty hand clapping down on his slim shoulder.

"Ryou," a voice growled in his ear, "I think I need a word with you."

He shut his eyes for a moment as dread flooded through him but collected himself as he turned around.

"Yes, Mr Uchimura?" he asked with his best smile, "About what?"

The stout, moustached man glaring at him, Mr Uchimura, was none other than the owner of Angels' Lot, and his boss. And if he wanted 'a word' with one of his lower employees, it was almost guaranteed that it wouldn't be about anything good.

"About Takeshi Sato," he snarled.

…See?

"I saw that little scene just now," Uchimura continued, "What did you think you were doing, pulling away like that?"

"I felt he was making improper advances, sir," he replied prudently.

"I don't give a damn if he had his hands down your trousers," he snapped, "You do _not _insult him like that, you hear me?"

"But I thought there were rules about the waiters and waitresses here?" Ryou said indignantly, a small spark of anger in his chest emboldening him to talk back, "As in, 'look but don't touch'? If he wants to grope someone, why can't he do it to one of the dancers? When they're off the stage that's what they get paid for."

"Because he doesn't _like _one of the dancers," his boss said stonily, "He likes _you, _though I'll be damned if I know why. And the usual rules don't apply to him. He's a big-shot and he pays well for what he gets here. So he can do whatever the hell he wants. And always remember, you can easily be replaced. So you do _not _say no to him, got it?"

A thousand searing words flew through Ryou's head, threatening to explode out of his mouth and tell this vile man that this wasn't fair and he couldn't just order him to act like some cheap hooker to please a man who didn't even deserve the respect of a worm.

But, as usual, he kept himself in check. No point in throwing his job away.

"Yes, sir," he said meekly, staring at his feet.

* * *

_**End chapter.**_

_**Finally…a scene from Ryou's perspective. I thought it would never come.**_

**_I read over this chapter kind of quickly because I had 'update-fever'. Sorry for any mistakes or general poor quality._**

_**A thousand thanks to AnimeLoverAngel, Niilan, Ayame Irina, LonelyLostAngel, gothboymylove, ONIX-21, leer, Schizo-of-Destiny, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, Thief of Spades, Daemon-In-White, RyouLoverForever, Strange Liou, noperfect917, Tenshi no Toki, Bluegrass Elf, RikaNipah and The Lunar Rainbow. You're all better than curly fries.**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	6. Lost & Found

_**Chapter 6**__**: Lost & Found**_

Bakura looked doubtfully at the gaudy building before him, with its blacked-out windows and flashing neon sign. Said sign – periodically illuminating in curly red letters – did indeed read 'Angels' Lot'.

But could this really be the right place? It looked so…seedy. Ryou would be about as in place here as a clown at a funeral.

But Malik _had_ described this whole area as 'sleazy'. It certainly fit _that _definition.

But for someone like Ryou – at least, the Ryou _he _remembered – this kind of establishment would be nothing short of menacing.

But…

Bakura growled softly. But, but, but. It was stupid arguing with himself. He wasn't going to find out the truth if he just stood out here in the street all night. He had hung around Malik's apartment undecidedly for far too long, with the result that it was now approaching eleven pm, and he knew that if he left this much longer, he would end up changing his mind again and stomping back to the nice side of town.

Gritting his teeth to strengthen his resolve, he approached the door, the sign above it becoming increasingly annoying as he did so. He wondered if it was in any way significant that the colour of the light was red. There was a young girl waiting to greet him at the entrance – a very, _very _scantily clad young girl, with a face so thickly caked in various powders that he half-expected it to crack and fall apart at any given moment. His lip curled slightly. Why didn't she just wear a mask and be done with it?

"Hiya," she said with a flirtatious smile from smudged cherry lips, pushing out her barely-covered chest, "Lookin' for a good time?"

"I'm _looking _for Ryou Bakura," he informed her coldly, looking into her heavily made-up eyes with disdain, "Does he work here?"

Her face fell considerably, her disappointment evident. Bakura laughed harshly in his head, though outwardly his mouth didn't even twitch. He supposed her crestfallen expression was understandable. After all, most customers who asked after Ryou probably weren't too interested in the girls this place had to offer.

"Yeah, he should be inside somewhere," she said lowly. He went to walk past her, but she grabbed onto his arm, "But come on, hon, I'm _way _more fun that him…"

"Let go," he said shortly, shrugging her off roughly. She scowled, clearly affronted. The powder on her forehead did indeed start to crack.

"It's a ten dollar entrance-" she started to snap, all playful pretence abandoned.

"_Take it, _for God's sake," Bakura snarled, throwing a handful of notes at her before storming inside. He'd picked a fair few wealthy pockets before coming here, so they could charge him whatever the hell they liked.

As soon as he stepped into the club, the smell of food, perfume and faint cigarette smoke swept over him. He noticed that the windows were not blacked out as he had first supposed, but merely covered by dark, heavy blinds. The lights were quite low, a lot dimmer than the blinding sign outside, and it took a few seconds for his eyes to adjust. There was, however, a very bright spotlight on the stage, on which there was a group of girls dancing, all wearing what appeared to be rather badly ripped swimsuits. In fact, they could all have been wearing parts of the _same _swimsuit for the amount of fabric each one of them possessed. Men sat at tables and hooted and whistled as they moved alluringly across their raised platform.

Bakura shook his head in annoyance. Ryou must be insane, working here. All these perverts would undoubtedly find his looks and proper airs _very _enticing. The boy would be like a drop of blood in a sea of very greedy sharks.

Hn. Well, maybe the brat was into that kind of thing. One never knows. He _had _'changed', after all. And if he was desperate for money, desperate enough to do just about anything, then this definitely looked like the kind of place he stood to make a _lot _of cash.

Just then, Bakura was snapped out of this brooding by the feeling of something tugging on the leg of his trousers. Rather perturbed, he looked down. He didn't know whether to be more or less perturbed when he saw it was a small girl, barely older than a toddler, with one tiny hand fisted in the material of his jeans.

"Ry-ou, are you done talking to the-? Oh," she looked up at his face and blinked a pair of huge hazel eyes, "You're not Ryou. Sorry. You have the same kind of hair."

"You know…Ryou?" he asked – noticing it felt odd to say the boy's name -, not sure if he should feel lucky that he'd stumbled upon a lead like this so quickly. He silently willed her to answer before she got scared of him and ran away.

"Ryou works here," she said with a blithe smile, "He's talking to the bad men. Are you one of the bad men?"

"I'm not _that _kind of bad man," Bakura said definitely, glancing around the spacious room and hating everyone he saw in it. He'd never had time for sick people like these, and he wasn't about to let himself be associated with them.

Though, it had to be said, he probably didn't look too great right now, standing in their midst.

"My daddy works here too," the little girl went on even though he hadn't asked, "I come and help him some nights, because I'm a good girl."

"…Help him?" Bakura repeated, slightly curious despite himself.

She nodded happily.

"I don't even want to know…" he muttered, "Look, do you know where Ryou is right-?"

He didn't need to finish that question because he suddenly heard a shout above the general din, and a moment later his hikari half-ran out of the crowd towards them. Upon reaching them, he grabbed the little girl and snatched her away from Bakura.

"Mio," he gasped as he did so, "Are you ok?"

She nodded dubiously, looking bewildered at the teen's apparent panic.

Bakura tensed slightly at his arrival. He'd never feared Ryou, and he was adamant that he never would. But still, the sight of him made him want to shudder and just stay quiet: in part due to the teen's harsh words and actions at their last encounter, and also because of that stupid dream he had had. He knew Ryou was different now, and as a consequence he felt differently towards him. But he'd be damned if he'd let him see that.

"One of yours, hikari?" he asked with a smirk, indicating to the small child, even though he knew that not to be the case.

"Get bent," Ryou snapped at him, his concerned expression being swiftly replaced by a glare. He picked the girl up and held her protectively, his blazingly angry eyes never leaving Bakura's face. Bakura decided that, if there was one good thing about this situation, it was that Ryou's face was completely devoid of the cheap, gungy make-up so favoured by his counterparts here.

"What's the matter?" Bakura asked, folding his arms, "Scared because you don't have your baseball bat with you?"

"I have an eight-inch steak knife through there, and I'll stick it where your heart's meant to be if you don't get yourself out of here," was the livid reply.

"You can't kick me out," Bakura told him with a sardonic smile, "I'm a paying customer."

"I don't _care_," Ryou hissed, "Get _out_!"

"Your threats are so empty…" Bakura continued, completely ignoring his hikari's command, "Come on…could you _actually _take a blade to me? You couldn't even take me out with that bat when you had your chance-"

"Shut _up_!" Ryou shouted, "Would you _prefer _that I killed you?"

His voice was getting progressively louder as Bakura taunted him, but no one seemed to be paying attention. Their little scene had been attracting a few stares a moment ago, but now the dancing girls had re-emerged from their dressing room, so they might as well have not existed. One extremely tall young man had been watching the potential skirmish unfold from across the room, though, and now he quickly made his way over to join them.

"Something up, Ryou?" he asked as he came up behind said teen.

"Get him out of here," Ryou forced out through clenched teeth, turning his back on Bakura and clutching the girl – Mio? – close to him, as if shielding her from him. Bakura snorted. How sweet.

"Why? What's he done?" the other asked, peering at Bakura suspiciously.

"Just get him out!" Ryou almost shouted, eyes shut tight as he fought to suppress whatever emotions were raging inside him.

"But he didn't do anything bad," Mio said with a naivety that reminded Bakura strongly of the way his hikari used to be.

"…What's going on here?" the tall man demanded, looking both confused and annoyed, "Ryou, who is this guy? If I'm gonna kick him out, I need a reason why."

The teen remained silent, lowering his head slightly. Bakura laughed inwardly. Well, what could the boy say? There was really no immediate reason for him to be punished, and no one here was going to believe him if he tried to explain all his past crimes.

The conversation was cut short just then, though, when a small, stout and yet somewhat intimidating man marched up to them, looking severely pissed off.

"Bakura!" he thundered. The yami frowned at him before realising he was referring to Ryou by his surname.

"Mr Uchimura…" Ryou said faintly.

"I wasn't finished with you," the man sneered, jabbing a sausage-like finger in the teen's direction, "Mr Sato and his party need refills. So get your skinny ass over there, serve their drinks, and show some bloody respect, or _else._"

Ryou just looked at him for a moment, tight-lipped, seeming torn between telling this guy that he was busy with something infinitely more important right now, or just doing as he was told and keeping his job. At length he appeared to choose the latter.

"No talking to bad strangers, Mio," he said quietly to the little girl before handing her over to his much taller companion. He then proceeded to turn and briskly walk away, not sparing Bakura another glance.

"…Aso, get that kid out of my sight," the short man, Uchimura, said irritably before striding off, presumably to find fault with someone else.

"Aye-aye, sir," the tall guy, 'Aso', said, rolling his eyes. Once the man was gone, he turned to Bakura and beckoned with his index finger.

"You," he said grimly, "Come with me."

Judging that, since he had no idea why he'd come here anyway and wasn't really interested in watching half-naked girls parading around a stage, he had nothing better to do, Bakura shrugged and obliged.

'Aso' led him through a set of swing double doors into what he quickly gathered was the club's kitchen. It was well-lit in here, the harsh electric tubes reflecting dazzlingly off the white and metallic surfaces, and Bakura had to half-close his eyes until they stopped seeing dancing black dots.

"Ryou won't tell me what happened yesterday," 'Aso' said, setting the little girl down and looking at him closely, "But judging from what I just saw, I'm guessing _you_ happened. Just who are you?"

Bakura bristled.

"Who are _you_?" he sneered right back, folding his arms.

To his slight perplexity, the other laughed affably.

"Kinda touchy, aren't ya?" he said in obvious amusement, "Relax, I ain't gonna give you trouble. At least, not unless Ryou gives me a good reason why I should. Name's Aso, Kazuma Aso."

He offered a hand, calloused and rough from much hard work and with 'H-A-T-E' tattooed across the knuckles. Bakura didn't take it.

"And you're friendly too…" Kazuma remarked dryly, letting his hand drop, "But whatever. Come on, who are you? We're in a kitchen, man. I have ways of making ya talk."

He was obviously joking, but Bakura found himself thinking back to Ryou's remark about the eight-inch steak knife and hated the fact that his hikari would even think of such a thing.

"It's Bakura," he said shortly.

"Ah. Relative of Ryou's?"

"_No_," the yami ground out, glaring at him for daring to even suggest that he and Ryou shared genes, "Bakura: _first name._"

Kazuma threw up his hands.

"Ok, ok, sorry," he said exasperatedly, "Jeezus, calm down, man. It is weird, though. I sort of assumed you two were related 'cos…well, you _almost_ _look _like Ryou."

"…Almost?" Bakura repeated, vaguely intrigued.

"Yeah," Kazuma said, nodding, "Kinda creepy, actually. When I saw you at first, I thought you two were almost identical. Figured ya must be his brother or something. But when I look at you now…you look _nothing _like him. Aside from that freakin' weird hair colour, there's nothing. In fact…this'll sound fuckin' bizarre…you guys nearly look like…_opposites _of each other."

"Really?" Bakura questioned ingenuously, turning his face away and smirking at how close to the truth the fool was, and yet how little he understood.

"Hn. Can't think why I ever thought ya looked alike," Kazuma said, shaking his head in puzzlement, "Anyway. You gonna tell me why Ryou wants you out of here so badly?"

"I don't see why that's of any consequence," he said coldly.

Kazuma raised his eyebrows and smiled slightly.

"Really? Maybe you should come check this out," he suggested, going back over to the double doors and pushing one open a fraction. Bakura followed, and looked where he was pointing. He saw Ryou, serving drinks to a large group of men at a circular table. They were all clearly more interested in their waiter than their beverages, and one of them in particular – an oily, peroxide-blonde specimen – was looking at him with rather more interest than could be considered quite healthy.

And he kept _touching _him. Grabbing at his hand, patting his shoulder, touching his arm. Bakura narrowed his eyes slightly. He'd never liked people touching Ryou, especially when it was ill-intentioned. He didn't know if it was because he'd once used the boy's body as his own, or because he felt he had some sort of claim on him, but either way, he _didn't like it._

"You see that guy there?" Kazuma said quietly, indicating to Mr Peroxide.

"The one who can't keep his hands to himself?" the yami replied acidly.

"Haha, yeah, him."

"What about him?"

"Ya see Ryou's talking to him?"

"Yes."

"So what do ya suppose Ryou's thinking about?"

Bakura looked at him suspiciously, questioning this rather odd enquiry. Kazuma shrugged and indicated to Ryou again, as if saying 'Just _look, _huh?'

Sighing irritably, Bakura directed his gaze back towards his hikari. He had finished handing out the various drinks, but still stood by the table. Mr Peroxide held his wrist tightly with one hand and was talking to him animatedly, about God knows what. Bakura scrutinised Ryou's face. He wasn't doing a lot of talking; he appeared more inclined to just let the older man babble away uninterrupted, and so stroke his ego by looking on with rapt interest. His expression was neither ecstatic nor depressed. Just that neutral, in-between look he had always been so good at. He would smile occasionally, but it was a pallid, distant smile, and it was clear his mind was elsewhere.

"Doesn't look like he's thinking about a lot, really," he said finally, "Or maybe he's thinking about what he's going to do after work tonight, or tomorrow, or next week. He's miles away."

"Yup," Kazuma said with a nod, "So how'd ya figure he feels?"

"What the _hell _are you talking about?"

"Answer the question and you'll find out."

Bakura scowled, hating being ordered around like this.

"He doesn't look like he's feeling a lot, either," he said snappishly, "He's not paying much attention to that guy, but he doesn't look too bothered about having to listen to him either. He probably likes the attention."

Kazuma laughed quietly, hazel eyes sparkling with a mischievous delight more suited to someone the little girl's age.

"Is that right?" he said, "Well, d'ya wanna know a secret?"

His childish antics were starting to grate on Bakura, but he decided to suppress his wrath for the moment and just looked at him expectantly. He chuckled again.

"That guy…" Kazuma said, pointing at Mr Peroxide, "His name's Takeshi Sato. He's a young businessman, who likes to come here after work with his buddies to chill out, and who also happens to have taken a great liking to Ryou," he paused for breath, or perhaps dramatic effect, "And the plot twist is…Ryou _hates_ him. He loathes him like he's some slimy, gross insect. If he _died _Ryou'd probably throw a friggin' party and dance on his coffin and poke pins in his dead eyes."

Bakura blinked, suitably bewildered. Ryou had always been good at keeping a lid on his true feelings, but not good enough to fool _him._

He looked back towards the table. Sato's mouth was still flapping away like there was no tomorrow. Ryou was still listening obediently, expression cool, detached and respectful. His look was as Bakura had seen before: a little lacking in interest and attentiveness, perhaps, but with nothing to suggest an intense dislike.

But now that he looked more closely, and knowing the truth, he thought he could see it, just a little. Like a current rippling beneath the water's calm surface, he could _just _discern a faint look of disgust, almost of sheer revulsion, lurking behind his unfazed exterior. And his eyes…there was a feeling hiding in those brown depths that he couldn't quite identify.

"Shit…" he breathed. This was just another thing that flagged up to him how little he knew his hikari now. And despite his insistence that he didn't care about him – and he truly _didn't _-, _that _pissed him off. He'd always enjoyed knowing Ryou inside and out – he'd known exactly how to manipulate him, exactly how he'd react to certain words or actions. It had been an amusement to him, and such a close understanding of the boy had given him a greater control over him. He had known precisely what to say to frighten him into obedience. How to keep him firmly under the thumb. It had suited him very well. So to come back now, and find this complete stranger…he didn't like it. He just wanted to leave Ryou behind, forget about him, maybe find some new little weakling to rule over…

His mysterious connection to Ryou came back to life for a brief moment and tugged at his head and heart indignantly, stubbornly reminding him that he just couldn't do that.

"He's good at hiding it, huh?" Kazuma said, bringing him back to reality, "That's why I'm so interested in you. 'Cos as much as Ryou _hates _Sato, he always manages to keep his cool. That guy's never managed to get a rise out of Ryou like you just did."

Bakura looked up at him, forehead creased in a frown.

"It's true!" the taller man said, "I mean, didn't ya see him just there? I was watching you two. He got all red and angry. I ain't _never _seen him like that before. So what you got on him?"

"What?"

"Y'know, who are you to him? Old boyfriend?"

"_No_," Bakura growled, resenting his lack of notoriety in this world. This idiot didn't even know how close he was dancing to a swift yet extremely painful death, "Enough of this. If you want me to leave because my presence is upsetting the brat so badly, why don't you just say so?"

"Leave?" Kazuma repeated, raising an eyebrow, "Why would I want you to do that?"

Bakura looked at him, silently demanding some elaboration, totally confused but not wanting to admit it.

"Man, the last time I saw Ryou _half _as animated as he got just there, he was on kitchen duty and the oven and microwave both packed in within an hour of each other," Kazuma laughed, "I don't know what the deal is with you two, but I _think _ya need to work it out between you. And it'd do Ryou good to let off some steam for once. So if you're brave, or crazy, enough to face his fierce side, I'd be pretty damn glad for you to stick around."

Bakura shook his head in a disbelieving manner, starting to get the feeling that Ryou had fallen in with a _very _weird crowd these past few years.

* * *

_**End chapter 6.**_

_**This was one of those 'I now want to kill myself' chapters. No matter how much I tweak it, it still doesn't sound right. Blah.**_

_**By the way, I'm impressed by how much everyone hates Sato already xD**_

_**If anyone's interested, I set up a livejournal account to answer questions or whatever about my increasingly outlandish fanfictions. It's also a place for me to post and discuss my far too in-depth ponderings about this story. Pretty pointless, really…But feel free to add me or take a look. The username is fiver_chaan [yes, there are two a's in 'chaan'…the spelling with one 'a' was taken]. But be warned, I still have no idea how livejournal actually works. I'll learn. I hope.**_

_**Thank you so much to Bluegrass Elf, RyouLoverForever, Niilan, AnimeLoverAngel, ONIX-21, Thief of Spades, The Lunar Rainbow, shadowrealm818, Yeung Xing Wun, Eressie, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, t recorder, Schizo-of-Destiny, Kiri-chan220, PharaohDeli, Marisa Kirisame, blackblood1616, Berries-R-Blue, wishfulliving89, gothboymylove and pride1289. You're like handprints on my heart :]**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	7. Thank Me Later

_**Chapter 7**__**: Thank Me Later**_

"Ryou," Takeshi said with a satisfied smile as the teen approached, "You came back to me."

"You wanted a refill," the teen said plaintively, once again handing out the alcohol-filled glasses.

"That's not all I wanted," Takeshi said, smile morphing into a smirk, catching his wrist. This time Ryou didn't pull away, knowing his boss was probably watching his every move. Well, whatever. Takeshi could pull out a 24-carat gold diamond ring, get down on one knee and propose to him right now and he probably wouldn't notice. His mind was on other things.

No prizes for guessing exactly _what _other things.

He bit the inside of his cheek anxiously. Why, why, _why _was Bakura here?

Actually…for that matter, _how _did Bakura know he worked here? He couldn't have followed that hateful 'connection' they seemed to share – when the spirit had been in the Ring it had been necessary, as his unfortunate host, to learn how to _block _that connection, to a certain extent. Ryou had been taken by surprise the previous morning, but now his protective firewalls were back in place. Three years had not made him forget. So how…?

He bristled slightly. Malik. It was probably Malik.

And that meant Malik was going to be hearing from him _very _soon.

Takeshi was talking to him, but he wasn't listening. It was probably something inane or disgusting he was saying, anyway. The occasional smile and nod would suffice.

_Gods_, he didn't want to see his yami here. Of course, he didn't want to see him anywhere ever again, to be perfectly blunt, but…if he'd had to run into him again he would have pleaded for it not to happen here. Here was where he was at his very lowest. He was _ashamed _to be seen here. If Yuugi or Malik or any of his old friends ever came looking for him here, it would break him completely. And no doubt Bakura would find it highly amusing.

Goddamnit, couldn't he take a telling? Ryou thought he'd made it perfectly clear that he wanted him to _stay away_. But, then again, it wasn't as if what he wanted mattered to Bakura. But he'd also made it clear that he couldn't be ruled over anymore. And he'd kind of assumed that once Bakura realised _that_, he'd lose all interest in him and never trouble his sad little life again. Unfortunately, it seemed like his shadow wasn't willing to let their tumultuous, dark story end so easily.

Maybe he thought he could wear him down, and eventually take over again. Maybe he thought that little scene at his apartment had just been an act, and he was still sweet, stupid, weak-willed Ryou underneath it all.

He smiled without humour. How stupid.

As if summoned by his thoughts, his yami suddenly emerged from the kitchen. Ryou watched him out of the corner of his eye, silently willing him to leave or at least engage in some activity that wouldn't involve or bother him. To his considerable displeasure, he did neither. He didn't even take a table like any normal customer. He merely stood and leaned against a wall, letting the shadows cast by the dim, low lighting camouflage him, and _observed_. Like a very evil fly on the wall, he monitored his surroundings with a slight twist to his mouth that immediately gave away the fact that he thought this place far, far below him. His crimson eyes were as sharp and piercing as ever, and Ryou knew they were fixed directly on him, probably full of malice and mockery. He turned his head away, the anger and shame gnawing away at his insides.

He gave a small gasp as Takeshi unexpectedly tugged hard on his wrist, pulling him forcefully down onto his lap.

"I feel like I don't have your full attention, Ryou," he said with a nauseating mock-pout, face inches from his. Ryou stared at him for a moment before averting his gaze slightly to the left, to look over Takeshi's shoulder. He could see Bakura. He was still watching him intently, but there was no amusement in his eyes now, and he was scowling. Ryou laughed inwardly. It undoubtedly pissed the Thief off to no end that a scumbag like Takeshi could touch him while he couldn't.

"Sorry, Mr Sato," he said sweetly, settling himself more comfortably, "I was distracted."

Takeshi looked astonished, and then very pleased with himself. Ordinarily if he had made such a bold, mischievous move, Ryou would have given him 'that look' and parted company with him rather swiftly. But tonight he'd put up with his gross attentions – as long as he didn't take it too far -, if only in an attempt to get rid of his darkness.

Ryou laughed softly to himself. He wondered if Takeshi would be glad or enraged if he knew that he was only letting him away with this behaviour because there was someone here he hated even more than him.

It was a different kind of hate, though…so different…

His hands curled into tight, cold fists without him really noticing. He'd never even _thought _about hating _anyone _until he'd received that _damn _Ring…

In his absent thoughts, and his determination to avoid his yami's eye, his gaze had wandered vacantly to the stage, where a new group of girls were starting a routine that would make any person with the slightest bit of modesty blush. Normally he refused, point-blank, to even look at the club's dancers. It made him feel sick, and very, very uncomfortable. He wouldn't deny that he looked down upon them with something close to repugnance, as if they were some kind of sub-breed and not quite fully human. They were truly shameless, and most of them thought nothing of going 'back-stage' with a customer when they weren't performing. He felt like they were hardly part of the same species as him, because he could hardly fathom how they could act like they did. But sometimes, like right now, he wondered if he should feel sorry for them. Maybe they didn't all enjoy this life. One of the current girls looked like she could easily be younger than him. No way was she older than eighteen. And she was someone's daughter, maybe someone's sister, niece, girlfriend. Did she choose this? Or had she just been pushed even closer to the brink than he had?

Takeshi had followed his line of vision and now laughed quietly against his ear, making him shudder.

"I'd sooner see you up there, little Ryou," he whispered confidentially. His warm breath gusted against Ryou's neck, and it felt like a hundred tiny insects scuttling over his skin.

Obviously Takeshi wasn't going to think of the dancers in quite the same way. To him, that young girl was just 'eye-candy' – a 'thing' for him to enjoy. Something to be used and then thrown away, like everyone else.

"Are you married, Mr Sato?" Ryou asked suddenly, turning to face him again. Takeshi's expression darkened slightly though he tried to maintain his usual cocky look.

"Why?" he questioned with false lightness, "You wanna be my little wife?"

It was at moments like these that Ryou distantly wondered if Takeshi thought he was a girl. He was never entirely sure.

"I just wondered…" he said vaguely, "I thought I heard somewhere that you were. But it seems strange. If you _are _married, why would you have any interest in me?"

His real question was 'What kind of woman would marry you?' but he kept that to himself. Takeshi visibly relaxed again.

"Aw, that's cute," he said in apparent amusement, "You think marriage is about love?"

"I've heard it said, I must confess," Ryou replied.

"Heh. Nah, I married money. Wife's a dumb broad who spends all her time getting her hair done and begging more money for us off her daddy. Not that I need her daddy's money these days. Yeah. I could just spoil you rotten."

"I'll keep that in mind…" Ryou said softly, looking away.

It was going to be a _long _evening.

* * *

Bakura leaned back against the wall, arms folded, simmering with disgust. The Ryou he remembered had had high moral standards. _This _Ryou seemed to have none.

He shook his head as Mr Peroxide (what was his name? Sato?) pulled Ryou down onto his lap like some lecherous old uncle. Ryou didn't even protest. Didn't look bothered in any way. And that guy was someone he was supposed to hate? Nah. That idiot Kazuma had it wrong. The brat was loving every minute of this.

"I didn't realise just how far you'd fallen, hikari…" he muttered lowly to himself, scowling in said teen's direction.

He was suddenly aware of a scraping sound coming from somewhere to his right. Looking round, he saw the little girl, Mio, dragging a rather high stool along the floor. She stopped when she reached him, clambered up onto the seat with all the gracelessness of early childhood, and smiled sweetly up at him. Bakura cast his eyes around for Kazuma, whom he'd gathered was her father, but couldn't see him anywhere.

"It's boring here," Mio said, swinging her short legs back and forth, "Ryou says only bad people like it."

"'Ryou' told you not to talk to me," Bakura pointed out, looking away from her. She giggled.

"Ryou said 'no talking to bad strangers, Mio'," she said, giving a rather impressive imitation of Ryou's solemn tone, "You don't seem so bad."

Bakura snorted. If she only knew.

When he didn't reply, she stood up on the stool and scrutinised his face (though she was still about a head shorter than him), wrinkling her small nose in exaggerated concentration.

"You look angry," she said finally.

"Well spotted," he replied dully.

"Because Ryou shouted at you?" she asked with another giggle.

"He can shout at me all he likes. It doesn't bother me."

"Ryou never shouts at me," She said proudly, "He says I'm a good girl."

"Uh-huh."

He couldn't quite believe that he, King of Bandits and stealer of souls, was in this situation. As in, stuck in a slimy nightclub being pestered by a five year-old. It was surreal for so many reasons.

"I don't think Ryou likes you very much," she commented with that complete lack of subtlety only children and the very cruel possess.

"You don't say," he muttered before turning back to her, not wanting to admit to himself that he was about to question a pre-schooler, "And what do you 'think' of him?"

Her small round face visibly lit up.

"Ryou? I _love _Ryou!" she declared almost fiercely, "I'm going to _marry _Ryou when I grow up!"

She performed a little twirl on her precarious perch on the stool to further illustrate these feelings.

"I guess that answers _that _question…" Bakura said with a slight grimace, feeling rather annoyed at himself for expecting any better.

"Do _you _like Ryou?" she asked brightly.

"No," he replied flatly without a moment's hesitation. Her small rosebud mouth morphed into an alarmingly perfect 'o' shape.

"Why not?" she demanded, hands on hips, looking as outraged as someone of her size and stature could. He looked at her and frowned. That…was a rather good question.

He'd never actually thought about it before, or consciously disliked Ryou for a specific reason. It had just been natural. There had been no question of _liking _him.

But why…?

Because…he disliked everyone. He disliked _people_, humans, homo-sapiens – call them what you will. He hated these descendents of apes, with their so-called 'societies' in which the rich and mighty ruled over everything and went unchecked, to the point of being able to order the needless massacre of an entire commune for their own personal gain. What was there to like about such a race? He may be human himself – though he had spent the past few thousand years not quite fully so, what with Zorc's spirit firmly lodged in him – but, given the chance, he would bring down all the people of the world. There was no good in any of them. They were all foul, even the ones who pretended not to be.

He smirked dryly. So, he wanted to destroy that which held no good? Did that make him evil, or a twisted saint?

Whatever. The bottom line was: people couldn't be trusted. And Ryou had defied him before, like in the first Shadow Game against the Pharaoh, ultimately proving that he was just like the rest, capable of deception and back-stabbing and willing to do both.

And, of course, Bakura was, as he'd said before, 'the bad guy'. He could curse mankind all he liked, but for all their faults, the desire to obliterate them would always make him 'the bad guy'. He was rotten through and through by their standards – a creature of darkness. Of course he'd hate his lighter counterpart.

…

So…_why _was he here?

When he made no reply Mio seemed to forgive his shocking misdemeanour and laughed and spun around again.

"If you come here a lot you'll like Ryou," she said confidently, "He's the only nice one. Him and my daddy."

He rolled his eyes, hoping she'd take the hint and go bother someone else.

Of course, keeping true to how his luck had gone throughout history, she didn't.

She did, however, stop babbling rather abruptly.

"…What?" he asked, and then immediately berated himself because she had finally shut up and now he'd gone and set her off again. She grabbed onto his arm and shook it urgently, pointing with her other hand.

"What's wrong with Ryou?" she asked, looking scared, "What's the bad man doing…?"

With some amount of trepidation, Bakura followed the direction of her wildly gesturing finger until his gaze landed back upon that table.

"…Oh, _come on_," he groaned aloud, one eye twitching.

He didn't know if that Sato guy was _drunk _or just even more of a bastard than he'd first suspected. All he knew was that the disgusting man – who seemed somehow _too _disgusting for one so young – had his arms around Ryou much too tightly, and his face was lingering _dangerously _close to the teen's.

He rolled his eyes and shook his head. This was nothing a five year-old should be allowed to see. Hell, he wasn't sure _he _wanted to see it.

"He's hurting him," Mio whined, still pulling on his arm as if it was some kind of lever that made him function. Bakura blinked, then frowned and looked again.

It was true, now that he looked closer. Ryou's carefully constructed expression of neutrality had crumbled, as most things do under severe pressure, and now his face was nothing short of panicked – as well as totally revolted. He squirmed like an eel, evidently trying to escape the man's clutches, but so far to no avail.

"Where's daddy?" Mio said in distress, looking around with eyes that appeared to be filling with tears, "He promised he wouldn't let the bad men hurt Ryou. He's s'posed to keep him safe."

She stamped her feet and tugged at her own hair, all the while watching Ryou with mounting anguish. Bakura's eyes flicked between his hikari and her, and he wondered about how upset she was getting. Did that mean this wasn't normal? This wasn't what Ryou did every evening? Was this something serious, or was it just that Mio didn't usually witness it?

"Daddy's not here," she said once she had checked the room several times with her unusually sharp gaze, "He can't help. Won't you go help? Please?"

Bakura stared at her incredulously.

"Me?" he questioned, amazed that she hadn't yet realised that he was 'bad', that he wasn't a big hero like her 'daddy'. Didn't he have an aura of deep rottenness about him, a fearfully wicked look in his eye? Weren't children meant to be perceptive to such things? Why didn't she _get it?_

"Yes!" she wailed, pulling on his arm ever more ferociously, "Go help Ryou!"

Bakura shifted his gaze back to his hikari. But wasn't this his 'job'? 'Entertaining customers'?

Just then, Sato gave a harsh, crowing laugh and leaned in suddenly towards Ryou, whose eyes went the size and shape of saucers. He twisted his head away desperately, so the bastard's mouth just grazed his jaw.

Bakura's eyes flashed furiously. Well, to hell with that. He didn't care if this _was _the brat's job; he wasn't going to stand and watch _this _sickening display.

People shouldn't touch Ryou, especially not in that manner.

In one quick, fluid motion he pushed himself off the wall and marched over to the table, slipping between the other customers and workers like a swift icy wind.

Ryou didn't see him coming, and so didn't know he was there at all until he grabbed his arm and hauled him off Mr Peroxide's knee. As he stumbled in surprised and tried to regain his footing, Bakura turned to Sato. The man's eyes were bleary and unfocused, and he was clearly rather drunk, but he still scowled at him as if to say 'what the hell do you think you're doing?'

"I think that's enough for tonight," the yami hissed, "You don't want too much of a good thing."

And he whipped around and stalked back towards the kitchen, dragging Ryou behind him the whole way.

"Let go of me!" said teen snapped as soon as they passed through the swing doors, "What do you think you're _doing? _I'll lose my goddamn job!"

He snatched his arm out of his grasp. Bakura tried to cover the jolt that had gone through him at hearing the boy curse again.

"Oh, I'm sorry," he retorted with acidic sarcasm, "Excuse me for not wanting you to get _molested._"

"Like you'd care," Ryou shot back, "Do you think I'd believe you'd _help _me? Don't insult me. You're just trying to screw up my life even worse than you already have."

"Of course," Bakura said, voice heavy with irony again, "Idiot. Why would I waste my time doing that?"

"For someone who can't be bothered making things worse, you're certainly making a good job of it," Ryou said lividly, rubbing furiously at his wrist as if trying to wipe away all traces of the hand that had pulled him in here.

"Who do you think you're fooling?" Bakura snarled, "Don't insult _me. _I was watching you. You were just waiting for someone to come and rescue you."

"I'd rather die in a pit than be 'rescued' by _you_," Ryou said fiercely, "And I was watching _you _too. You were talking to Mio. Stay _away _from her."

"Hey, _she's _been following _me_," he said heatedly, "And what's the panic? You think I'm going to _hurt _her? I'm not in the habit of harming small children, hikari."

Ryou gave a short, humourless laugh.

"Liar," he spat, "What about Mokuba? You spent a considerable amount of time trying to steal his body away from him in order to inhabit it on a permanent basis. Wouldn't that count as _harming _him?"

Bakura had to fall silent at that.

True. He _had _done that.

Why…?

"What is it you want, anyway?" Ryou demanded suddenly, "Why did you follow me here?"

"You flatter yourself," Bakura told him coldly, "Whoever said I came here looking for _you? _Maybe I just felt like a night out."

Ryou gave another one of those laughs that wasn't really a laugh at all, because he clearly wasn't happy and obviously wasn't finding anything funny.

"Wow," he said a smile that held absolutely no warmth, "I knew you were _low, _but I never would have known you disgusting enough for a place like _this_."

This barb angered Bakura for a moment, but then he saw the opportunity in it. His mouth spread into a cold smirk.

"That's good, coming from _you,_" he said with slow, deliberate cruelty,"You _work here_."

Ryou's face flushed scarlet, and Bakura knew he had hit him where it hurt. And he was glad of it, because maybe that blow would distract his hikari from pursuing _that_ question – the question of just why he was here. He didn't want to answer it, because he really didn't know.

"Nice 'uniform', by the way," he remarked, looking disparagingly at Ryou's bare stomach.

"Shut up," the teen mumbled, untying the knot in his shirt and tugging it down.

"Aw, don't do that," Bakura said, feigning disappointment, "I'm sure everyone was enjoying the view."

"Shut up," Ryou said again, voice trembling slightly. Bakura smirked, enjoying this more than was quite proper. Rather like the old days, wasn't it? Ryou had decided to show him that he couldn't be controlled anymore. So he was just reminding his dear little hikari that he held no power over him, either.

"So what _exactly _is it you do here?" he asked indolently.

"Get out," Ryou ordered, but with no real conviction.

"'Entertaining customers', is it?" the yami continued, regardless, "How 'entertaining' are you? Is sitting on their laps as far as it goes? Or would a few extra dollars make you go…further?"

"_Shut up!_" Ryou shouted, clamping his hands over his ears, "What right do you have to judge _anyone _about what they do for a living? You're just a _thief – _a pathetic _leech _who relies on crawling around in the dark and taking the money others have actually _worked _to earn!"

Bakura seethed inwardly. He didn't like this 'new Ryou'. He talked back. He'd always appreciated that about the old Ryou: he rarely, if ever, talked back to him.

Maybe 'appreciated' was the wrong word. That implied he'd actually cared.

Though he had to admit, there was something rather intriguing about this Ryou. The nineteen year-old, world-weary and disillusioned Ryou. His looks, for one thing. He was 'pretty' – of course, he always had been. From a completely objective point of view, Bakura could say that. And the boy's personality shift only made his unchanging features all the more fascinating: his angelic face and slender, willowy frame coupled with that stubborn, unbending will and the fierce, intense look he was capable of were nothing short of soul-shattering.

But there was something else, too. Some kind of steely self-assurance and near-_defiance _animated his previously childish face and eye; it was not confidence, no, Bakura was willing to bet that he was as shy and insecure as ever, but it was as if he understood himself a little better now, knew his faults and weaknesses and would not let any other person exploit them. Three years of loneliness had taught him about himself, and how to change, and he appeared less meek and humble for it. He was so fiery – not willing to be pushed around or silenced, not hesitating to shout or snap or even raise his hands. And yet at the same time he was as cold and untouchable as a bite of wintry frost. He knew when to keep his mouth shut and how to conceal and suppress his feelings, leaving his eyes two barren wastelands of dust and snow that no one on this earth could hope to read. Fire and ice contained within the same being, Bakura realised. A strange and potentially dangerous combination.

"Are you really so far above me, hikari?" he asked lazily, "After all, in human society, who is more looked down upon? A thief…or a whore?"

Ryou visibly flinched at that word, and his eyes sparked threateningly, but then the ice came back to the fore and his face smoothed out, becoming unnaturally calm.

"What is it you want?" he asked quietly, "Just tell me what you want, and then go."

"How do you know I want anything?"

"You wouldn't be here if you didn't. Just say it, so you can leave. I already told you I don't want you near me."

"Ah," Bakura smirked, "Maybe _that's _why I'm here."

"That would make sense," Ryou said bitterly, turning away.

"Did you feel good about yourself yesterday? Did you think you could actually tell me what to do?" Bakura asked him with a cold, mocking laugh, "You surprised me, I'll admit. That's why it looked like I did what you told me to. But as you can see, hikari…surprise doesn't last long. And you're as powerless as ever."

Ryou looked back at him, expression pained. That same emotion Bakura had been unable to identify before had returned to his eyes. Only this time he could name it without hesitation: it was despair. Despair at being so utterly powerless, at having to work in this disgusting place, at his whole shitty life. Bakura could see his words had, once again, hurt him badly. Ryou wanted to believe he was strong now. He didn't want to be told that, really, his existence was being controlled just as much as before – just in a more indirect way. He was controlled by the dictates of a harsh society that didn't want him, by his boss here, by the limits on his very existence. His so-called 'independence' was just a farce.

"Maybe I'm powerless," Ryou said finally, voice shaking, "But I'm still better than you. There's no one worse than you."

Bakura looked at him silently. Something about the blunt way he'd said that, with the acidic hatred in his voice, left him without a reply.

He was saved from looking too foolish, however, because at that moment Kazuma appeared with Mio in tow. He stopped short when he saw the two of them staring each other down.

"Oh," he said with a slightly sheepish look, "Am I interrupting?"

After a few seconds of stillness, Ryou broke eye contact with his yami.

"…No," he said tiredly, "No, we're done here."

"Alright. Time for you to clock off anyway, kid. It's past your bedtime," here Ryou shot him a quick glare but he just laughed, "I collected your money for tonight from Uchimura."

He held out a rather unimpressive bundle of notes to the teen, who accepted them and counted them with a frown.

"This is only half of what I'm due," he said at length.

"Um…yeah. The boss man said…that's what happens when you insult a customer. I'm sorry," Kazuma continued at Ryou's horrified expression, "I tried to talk him out of it, but you know what he's like. Thinks the sun shines right out of Sato's ass."

Ryou nodded dejectedly. Kazuma dug in his pocket and extracted another small pile of banknotes.

"I think this'll make up for it," he said, holding them out. Ryou looked first at the money, then at him, questioningly.

"…Sato left it for you," Kazuma said hesitantly, "A tip for his favourite, he said."

Ryou shut his eyes for a moment. Bakura knew that in better times he would have done the noble – or snobby, or stubborn, whichever way you looked at it – thing and said he didn't want it – it was _dirty. _As it was, this was no matter of choice. He reached out, looking sick with himself as he did so, and took the crumpled green notes, expression utterly defeated.

"Ya need a ride home?" Kazuma asked softly.

"I'll walk," Ryou said shortly, turning to leave. He paused, though, and turned back to Bakura.

"Just so you know," he said, chin stuck out defiantly, "I'm no whore. I don't care what you think of me, but I can't stand for _anyone _to think _that _about me. Not even you."

And then he walked through another set of swing doors at the back of the kitchen and was gone.

"…Uh-oh," Kazuma said, wincing, "You thought he was offering himself up here?"

"I wasn't sure if he'd stooped that low," Bakura replied blandly, "But I said it anyway. I suppose it's in my nature to say things that get to him."

"Hn. You and Sato, both."

"Don't compare me to _that _bastard," he said venomously.

Kazuma looked at him for a long moment.

"You plannin' on coming back here, man?" he asked at length.

"What's it to you?" Bakura demanded in reply, immediately defensive.

"Oh, gee, I dunno. Maybe I'll just _kick your ass _if you ever show your face round here again, huh?" Kazuma suggested sarcastically, "Relax, will you? I think it'll be good if ya come back. I hate the way Ryou keeps everything in, even when it's driving him crazy. If screaming at you helps him cool off, I ain't got a problem."

"Whatever…" Bakura muttered, turning to leave.

"Hey, I wasn't finished," Kazuma called after him, "Listen up. I'm happy for Ryou to take all his shit out on you, but that ain't much reason for you to hang around here. So how about we make a deal?"

Bakura turned around slowly to look at him through narrowed eyes.

"A deal?" he repeated.

"Yeah," Kazuma confirmed, "Maybe I can make taking his beatings worth your while. I heard you got Ryou out of some trouble while I was busy talking to the boss man. Snatched him right out of the jaws of evil."

"I don't think he was in quite _that _much danger," Bakura said dryly.

"Whatever. Fact is, with Uchimura telling him he ain't allowed to protect himself from that guy, _someone _needs to be lookin' out for him."

"And you think that 'someone' should be me?" Bakura asked with a slight sneer, "I don't see how this is making me more likely to come back to this shit-hole."

Kazuma sighed exasperatedly.

"You still ain't lettin' me finish," he said, "Shut up for a second. If you come here and ya do what ya did tonight, that's worth cash. The bouncers here do less, and they get paid. I ain't sayin' it's a 'job' – cos it's not – but I can fix it so ya get cash in hand at the end of the night. And it'd give you a chance to patch things up with Ryou. Ya could be killin' two birds with one stone."

Bakura narrowed his eyes further. 'Patch things up'? Was that what this idiot thought he wanted to do?

"And another thing about this place…" Kazuma continued, obviously mistaking his disgusted silence for thinking it over, "No one asks questions. Where ya come from, what you've done, proof of ID…we don't care. No one's too bad for this place. Ryou's too good, but that's another matter. What d'ya say?"

At that, Bakura paused to consider. At first it had seemed like a ridiculous offer, and he had been ready to laugh in this guy's face. But now that he thought about it…it would allow him to kill _more _than two birds with one stone. He still wasn't sure what he was going to do about the Ryou scenario, but if he was getting paid to keep the brat's ass out of trouble, that gave him an actual _reason _to be near him. That meant he could stop trying to justify his actions regarding the teen to himself. And earning some money sounded like a good idea. He had grown up and lived only stealing to survive, but that had been in Egypt, during his old life. Things had been different then. You couldn't steal much now without eventually getting noticed, despite mankind's overwhelming stupidity. Besides, while the title 'Thief King' came with a certain amount of glamour, thievery had always been, fundamentally, a necessity – a means of staying alive. So if he could get cash by legitimate means (or as legitimate as it got around here), why not?

And he'd be damned if he'd let himself live owing Malik a favour. Relying on his charity would be the single most humiliating thing he'd ever endured in five thousand years of wandering the earth.

And no questions asked. How many times would he get an offer like that?

"Fine," he said finally, "I'll give it a try. No promises, though."

"Great," Kazuma grinned, "There is _one _question I wanna ask, though. Just one."

"What?" Bakura asked suspiciously, feeling somewhat cheated.

"Just your name, man," Kazuma told him, "Full name."

For almost any other person, this would have set them at ease: it wasn't a probing question that they'd have any trouble answering. But Bakura had to pause. He hadn't used his full name – his _family _name – in…well, eons. He had always just been 'Bakura' – 'Yami no Bakura'.

To his slight disturbance, he found he had forgotten his birth name.

He had to think for a few moments before it came to him.

"Bakura Touzoku," he said at last, only hoping Kazuma wouldn't notice the surprise in his voice. The name sounded strange and unfamiliar to him, as if it belonged to someone else, a person far away and a long time ago.

"Well, Bakura Touzoku," Kazuma said, grinning wider, "Welcome to Angels' Lot."

He extended his hand again in a second attempt at a handshake, but Bakura merely arched an eyebrow at him and he eventually let it drop.

"So when do I have to be here?" the yami asked irritably.

"Whenever Ryou's here. You've got both eyes on him from the second he steps out there, got it? And you'll have your hands full, trust me. He's popular with these maggots. You've gotta be like his friggin' _shadow_."

Bakura started slightly at that last order. Ryou's shadow?

Been there, done that.

"So what hours does he work, then?" he demanded, shaking off his disquiet.

"Hm…I lose track, cos I'm just here pretty much all the time. You'll prob'ly have to ask him yourself. Be here at six tomorrow night, anyway. I know that's when he starts on Fridays. Busy night."

"You know, he'll probably attack you when you tell him that you've given me an excuse to come here," Bakura informed him flatly.

"Yeah, well. What he don't know won't hurt him."

"It might."

"If he gets hurt, I'll break the spine of whoever hurt him," Kazuma said with a smile that seemed to have a warning edge to it, "Just act like a customer, like ya did tonight, and don't let him outta your sight. It seemed to work well enough."

"Whatever."

"Heh. Anyways, see ya tomorrow, Bakura Touzoku," he said cheerily, heading for the same set of doors Ryou had left by, calling Mio to his side as he did so.

"Is it closing time?" Bakura asked, perplexed.

"Hah, no, this joint never sleeps. I'll be back in a while. I'm just gonna go follow Ryou in my car until he agrees to take a lift. As if I'd _actually _let him walk around in the dark in this place. You should be careful on your way home, too."

And then, like Ryou, he was gone.

Bakura stood in the ensuing silence, staring at the floor. 'Home'. There was no 'home'. There was never a 'home'.

Exhaling noisily, he strode out of the kitchen and left by the front door, already wondering if he had just made a very bad decision.

* * *

_**End of chapter. And end of Thursday night…finally. Seriously. Three chapters for one evening?!**_

_**In case anyone's wondering, Sato was downing shots the whole time Mio was bugging Bakura :P That's why he was suddenly a lot drunker than he was in the Ryou's-perspective scene xD**_

_**Thanks and loooove go out to pride1289, Niilan, ONIX-21, Thief of Spades, Twilight-Imp-626, Berries-R-Blue, The Lunar Rainbow, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, thefullygirlalchemist, Schizo-of-Destiny, athrun zala08, AnimeLoverAngel, PharaohDeli, saturnoutlaw, new-found, chibi heishi, mystralwind, Ceilo, KyoxSakiFan, gliitch and Pork Steak the Grande. You are all the wind beneath my wings :]**_

_**I'm running out of one-liners to tell you guys how awesome you are…**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	8. First Blood

_**Chapter 8**__**: First Blood**_

_I stared unblinkingly at the snake as it lay motionless on its lengthy belly on the dry, cracked ground. Its undulating body curled round lazily on itself, like a thick rope about to be tied in a noose, and I couldn't decide if its scaly skin looked smooth and polished or prickly and __thorny. I squinted my eyes, but it made no difference; the midday sun beat down hot and heavy, glaring off the endless sand and making my vision uncertain and wobbly. Far from being able to discern precise details, I was in constant peril of losing sight of the creature completely, so well did its colour match its surroundings: both were dusty yellow and parched brown, like almost everything that made up the backdrop of my life. Mud-brown houses, bland-yellow sand, sun-darkened people. The sky was a constant wonder to me – its vivid, intense blue on a clear, bright day was the most incredible colour ever to invade my insipid existence._

_The snake twitched its tail in a bored manner, and the movement sent a thrill of fear through me. My small body ached from squatting in the same position for so long, but I didn't dare move. Not yet. Waiting for the right moment was important._

_I turned the fist-sized rock over in my hands. I hadn't come out here today to do battle with a snake. A train of merchants had passed this way yesterday, and I, with my eye for trinkets so disapproved of by my parents, had come to comb the barren ground for anything they may have dropped. I couldn't help it. I needed __**colour**_**, **_deep and strong. I yearned for something that wasn't the hue of mashed chickpeas. My family thought me an odd child, I knew, and the elders of the village often chastised me, saying I thought too much of the appearance of things. I didn't care. Maybe my thoughts were above theirs – maybe they thought in dull browns and yellows, while I hungered for something more._

_Once, a few years ago, I had fallen and gashed my knee against a sharp stone jutting out of the ground. While my sister screamed and wailed and my mother searched desperately for rags that would do for bandages, I had marvelled at the glistening, gleaming redness that existed inside me, just below the surface, and wondered why people weren't a more interesting colour on the outside too. And the sky was all very well to gaze at until its very brightness hurt my eyes, but I couldn't touch it or hold it or call it my own. Perhaps that was all I asked: a tiny shard of colour that was mine and mine alone._

_And so I had come here, trawling in the dirt for baubles I had little hope of finding – merchants guarded their wares so jealously – and then, just as I had been on the verge of surrendering to the dull irritation of yet another failed search, my adversary had appeared. I had heard the tell-tale __**swiiish **__of scales against sand and, upon turning my head, had observed my foe's meandering coils sifting along the ground before he – for I felt instinctively, for some reason, that it was a 'he' – stopped not far from me and sunned himself or slept or engaged himself in some other quiet, snaky activity. I had not moved since then, except to carefully reach out and claim my jagged, heavy rock, with which I planned to crush his skull._

_I fingered the__ rock doubtfully. I'd never had to kill a snake by myself before. I'd seen it done, of course. I knew the motions. But never before had it fallen to me to raise a weapon and snuff out a fellow creature's life. It had always been the duty of an older person, or – in the case of snakes – that of the mongoose kept and revered in the village. Could I do it?_

_I chewed the fleshy inside of my cheek thoughtfully. Maybe the real question was…__**should **__I do it? The snake wasn't harming me, as it was. It was just lying there, minding its own serpentine business. Was it fair to kill it because it __**might **__hurt me, or __**might **__hurt someone in the future? Because there was a chance that it may one night slither into an infant's bed and strike with its venomous fangs, did that make it right to kill it now as it lay there, innocent?_

_I sat back on my heels slightly. If that was true, didn't that mean that every baby that was born, human or animal, should immediately be killed? No one in this world grew up without hurting __**something**__. Should I have been killed, because I would grow up to harm a snake? Or did the rules not apply to humans? Did we claim superiority on this matter, like in everything else?_

_This was the first time my mind had raised the immense moral question of right and wrong, and I, being the child I was, shrank back from it shyly, afraid its enormity might swallow me completely. I was not a humble and modest boy, but I truly felt that such a debate was far above me. I had seen so little of the world, and knew even less. How could I be expected to come up with a satisfying answer to a question that even the Gods seemed undecided over?_

"_Should you die, Snake?" I asked aloud, peering my enemy in the face, "I've seen your brothers and sisters come into my village and bite and poison the people around me. Babies and old people and whoever else. If I let you go, you could sneak into my house tomorrow, and kill me, or my little sister, or my mother. What of that?"_

_The snake blinked languidly, and I could have sworn it was challenging me, daring me to spill its blood and take away its life and not cry for it afterwards. Be a man, it said._

_Still I hesitated, undecided. I barely even flinched when I watched others deal with snakes and whatever other unwanted animals appeared in the village, but now that I had suddenly been presented with the opportunity to carry out the deed myself, the idea of __**killing, **__even something not human, seemed gargantuan. Like a line that, once crossed, could never be reclaimed. Something that would change me forever. A step out of childhood._

_I crouched down lower and wrapped my arms around my knees, my sun-tanned forehead creasing in a frown. I didn't want to kill it. I didn't want to look at its smashed, lifeless body and know it was my fault. I didn't want to grow up. Not yet._

_I looked at my foe one last time, my mouth twisting from side to side as I wondered if my decision made me weak or brave or foolish or clever. At length I stood up, my cramped muscles sighing in relief, and made to turn towards home._

_However, the snake seemed to have its own plans regarding its fate._

_I didn't know if my rising to my feet had intimidated the creature, or if this serpent had been sent as some sort of test for me that I was not allowed to turn my back on. All I knew was that in the instant I moved, the snake's body seemed to go coiled, tight and rigid, its mouth hissed loudly and, before I could even blink, the whole creature shot at me like a deadly, gold-brown arrow. I cried out and leapt back, catching a terrifying glimpse of its monstrous fangs as they just missed me. Then, as the animal slumped back to the ground in the wake of its failed assault, my hand – still clutching my carefully selected rock – rose of its own accord and fell with that first instinct that comes to all humans: the instinct to destroy and kill all else in defence of ourselves. All this in a fraction of a second, without me having time to think or even decide what I would do. My first feeling as I felt rock meet bone was outrage – I hadn't wanted this! I wanted you to live, you __**damn **__snake! My hand came down again and again in mounting fury._

_There was silence, and stillness._

_The next sound I became aware of was my own breathing, harsh and erratic as my heartbeat pounded through me. I looked down. The snake was dead, its head mashed into the dirt, a mess of scales and blood and skull. I dropped the gory rock, feeling sick. One of those terrible fangs had been broken off in my blind onslaught, snapped off almost at the root, and a newly awakened voice in my mind – a gloating, cruel voice – told me to take it as a sort of trophy, wear it around my neck with pride and brag to the other boys of the village of my first real kill._

_But it was the other voice in my head that won. The voice that screamed at me not to touch it and to just turn around and run all the way home._

_I didn't speak a word of the ordeal when I arrived back. I told everyone I'd been treasure-hunting and hadn't found anything, and they laughed at me quietly in the usual way and went back to what they had been doing. I couldn't tell them what had happened, what I'd done. Perhaps I was ashamed._

_I wandered around vacantly, trying to forget the event but knowing I never would. It had opened my eyes to a harsh truth: that in this world, you had to kill to live. You had to attack before you were attacked. You had to kill before you were killed. __**You **__had to take the initiative and act, because if you waited around to see what would happen, something – or someone – was going to get you. And they wouldn't wait, and they wouldn't wonder if what they were doing was right, and they wouldn't care if it wasn't fair._

"_Bakura."_

_I started as I heard mother call on me sharply. I opened my mouth to ask what was wrong, but before I could utter a sound her strong, work-hardened hands gripped my shoulders and steered me forcefully back to our sun-baked mud-brick little house and pushed me inside. My first absurd idea was that she had found out what I had done and I was to be punished – but now she stood in the doorway, scowling out at something, and I knew it wasn't me she was angry at. My sister was already inside, huddled in a corner, and mother reached back and grabbed me with one hand to keep me firmly behind her, as if shielding me from something. I wriggled in her grasp, curious, and eventually managed to peek out through the space between her body and her arm. I saw a group of men – too finely dressed and well-groomed to have come from anywhere nearby. And they were seated on creatures I barely recognised._

_Horses, my mind told me factually after a long moment of thinking._

_Horses! My eyes widened. Such beasts were for noblemen and royalty. Who were these men, and what did they want in Kul Elna?_

_Even in my awe, I didn't fail to notice the look of blatant suspicion and distrust on mother's face. It made me uneasy, but I couldn't think of a reason for it. Our village was tiny – barely consisting of one hundred people – and never got involved in political matters. We could have done nothing to offend these wealthy men._

_And though I had today learned that sometimes you must kill to survive, I still held fiercely to the idea that people would not harm each other without reason. _

_Because they didn't._

…_Right?_

Ryou jolted out of sleep as he heard the shattering of glass.

He didn't move for a moment – just lay perfectly still, shutting his eyes again in a resigned, depressed manner as he contemplated the possibility that one of his windows had just been smashed in. It wouldn't be the first time – quite a few stray bricks had flown his apartment's way over the past couple of years – but it wasn't something one ever got used to. He couldn't afford to have the broken ones replaced, and it wasn't as if his landlord gave a damn if he died of draught-induced chronic pneumonia. As a result, he already had two window-frames – one in the bathroom, the other here in the living room – boarded up with a mixture of brown paper, plywood and (hopefully) resilient tape. At least the one in here was in the corner, and so could usually be hidden by the drapes. But he didn't think he could take another one…

He cut off this train of thought and grumbled at himself to have some backbone. If there was another broken window, he'd deal with another broken window. Did he think he had a choice, anyway?

Sighing heavily, he opened his tired eyes again and forced himself out of bed to go and investigate. He was mildly surprised to find all of the remaining living-room windows intact. The sound had been near, so he didn't think it could have come from one of the other rooms. He looked through the glass onto the street below, trying to locate the source of the noise. The sun was little more than half over the horizon, and its weak rays – which seemed reluctant to penetrate these hostile streets – revealed around three smashed liquor bottles littering the sidewalk, and a couple of rowdy drunks staggering away from them. From where the slivers of glass were now lying, it was safe to assume that they had been thrown at the apartment block and had smashed against the wall somewhere very near his window. Ryou breathed a sigh of relief. Just some drunken idiots. Small concerns, compared to some of the other specimens this place had to offer.

His mind immediately strayed to Takeshi Sato, and what he'd tried to do last night, and he shuddered.

He checked his watch and saw it was just past seven am. He'd left work around midnight, maybe fell asleep just after one. So that gave him a grand total of about…six hours sleep. That was sure going to keep him perky. He glanced at his bed for a moment but in the end just straightened the duvet and plumped the pillow and left it. He wouldn't get back to sleep now, anyway.

It was only after he'd padded barefoot into the kitchen and started spooning coffee into a mug that he remembered his dream.

"Strange…" he murmured, switching the kettle on. And it had been strange. Everything had had such _clarity…_the bright sun, the dry, desolate landscape, the dead snake. It was unusual. Normally his dreams were fuzzy, indistinct and completely unrelated scenes all smushed together, making very little sense. Not like this one. It had been one complete scene, everything functioning in perfect chronological order.

He started to feel a little uncomfortable. It had been _too _real, in fact. He had actually _felt _the hot, burning sun on the back of his neck, the painful stiffness of his muscles, the crunching of the snake's skull under his hand. He felt a stab of guilt and nausea, even though it had only been a dream and he hadn't really killed anything.

The kettle clicked sharply as steam puffed from the spout, and he filled his waiting mug. When had he started to like coffee…? He'd always hated it as a kid. Maybe it was more the caffeine content than the taste that appealed to him now…

The people in his dream had been freakishly real, too, just like the scenery. But they weren't people he was familiar with in any way. He'd known them _in _the dream, but when he thought back now, he'd never seen them before in his life. How could he have dreamt about them so vividly, seen their faces so clearly, if his mind had just conjured them up from nowhere?

His unease grew as more of it came back to him. Now that he considered it more closely, he hadn't even been _himself _in the dream. He'd been eight years old, in fact – he remembered an awareness of being that age. But he hadn't been _himself _as an eight year-old. It hadn't been a personal memory, not at all. In that bizarrely lifelike dream-world, he'd been a strong, wiry child, brown as a nut, scrambling around in his bare feet and wearing nothing but a crude linen robe. He'd never been like that in real life.

He sipped his piping-hot coffee and confirmed it still tasted foul. Needed milk.

Was it possible for his mind to create something so complex? A whole new person, with thoughts, feelings and personality different from his own? An entire landscape around him? A _family? _There had been a mother and little sister – but not _his _mother, not Amane. Nothing like them.

He shook his head roughly in an attempt to banish all thoughts of it from his mind. Why was he making such a big deal out of a dream? He'd probably read a book or seen a movie with that scene in it, and it had been floating around in his subconscious for a while.

He tried to ignore the nagging voice at the back of his head reminding him that he hadn't watched a movie in a hell of a long time, and the only books he had time to look at nowadays were newspapers and textbooks.

He took the milk carton out of the fridge.

Then his breath caught in his throat, his eyes widened and he dropped it as one last detail came flooding back to him.

That woman, the one he had never seen before in all his days, and yet who had been perfectly familiar to him while he slept, she…

She had called him 'Bakura'.

First name, Bakura.

And he had answered to it.

* * *

Malik yawned widely and propped his elbows against the front counter of the Kame Game Shop, cradling his face in both his hands as he blinked tiredly.

"Thank God it's Friday," he mumbled, "I'm just going to sleep tomorrow. All day. Sleep. And Sunday too."

"You had a class last night?" Yuugi asked from where he was peeking through the latest shipment of Duel Monster cards. None of the gang really played the game anymore – Malik hadn't touched a card since Battle City, and perhaps the others had just grown out of it for their own reasons – but they'd be lying if they said they didn't still have an interest.

"Yeah," the blonde replied with a half-nod, half-yawn, "And it ran late because the professor's a goddamned moron. You know he _forgot _he was meant to be teaching? He showed up almost an hour late, and then made us stay an hour extra to make up for _his _stupid mistake. I swear, that guy shouldn't be _teaching _shrinks, he should be _seeing _one."

Yuugi laughed lightly and gave him a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. Malik shot him a quick smile.

He sometimes wondered if Yuugi and the others still held the events of Battle City against him. Sure, Mariku had perhaps caused the worst of the havoc, but he'd done some pretty nasty things himself. He'd been angry. He'd lived a trapped life. He'd been forced to take on a painful destiny and duty he hadn't asked for. Did that excuse him in their eyes? Or did they just think everyone deserved a second chance?

Either way, it had still been awkward as hell when he'd first come back here and he and Yuugi had bumped into each other for the first time. He didn't know why he'd been so shocked to see him. He'd always known Yuugi lived here…and, now that he thought back, that was probably one of the main reasons he'd chosen to come to Domino. To see if he really was damned. To see if he could ever be forgiven.

Apparently so. Despite the initial 'Ooh…a few years ago you tried to kill me' and the accompanying 'Ooh…a few years ago I tried to kill you' (not spoken aloud, obviously), Yuugi had been friendly and welcoming, if a little uncertain. They'd got to talking, and when he'd mentioned that he was struggling to find work Yuugi had immediately offered him a place at the Game Shop. Just like that. As if he could be trusted. As if all that stuff never happened.

"So where's Pharaoh today?" Malik asked suddenly.

"Well, me and grampa said that obviously he can stay with us as long as he wants, but he said he at least wants to help out here in return," Yuugi told him, "So I think grampa and Otogi are showing him the ropes just now."

"Uh-oh," Malik said with a grin, "Does that mean I'm out of a job?"

"Of course not," Yuugi laughed, "But, really, you should start calling him Atemu. Remember, here, in this time, he isn't a Pharaoh anymore."

"Old habits die hard," the blonde said with a shrug, "Besides, I think that no matter where he goes or what time he's in…he'll always be a Pharaoh."

"Hm…I guess you're right," Yuugi granted, "But, y'know, people will start looking at us weird if we keep calling him '_mou hitori no boku_' and 'Pharaoh' in public."

Malik gave a chuckle of agreement. There seemed to be no awkwardness now, anyway, and no animosity from any of the gang.

Well. Almost none.

He'd apologised for his actions many times, and they had waved it off with a smile. They forgave and forgot so easily, all of them, even the ones his darker half had trapped and practically tortured. It was as if they had _known, _instinctively, that the dark, festering core of anger and hate was gone from him, and he wanted to start over. They had given him that chance. Even Ryou, whom he had expected to be perhaps the most suspicious of him since he'd worked alongside Bakura, had had few qualms, and they had become surprisingly close very quickly. But then Ryou got sick, and then Ryou changed…

Malik shook his head, not wanting to remember that horrible time.

But, yeah. Pretty much everyone here had offered the olive-branch of friendship to him. He was happier than he'd ever been before in his life. Maybe that was why he had extended a helping hand to Bakura without hesitation, despite knowing of his past deeds. Because others had done the same for him. Kindness spread kindness, he supposed.

"So…um…" Yuugi started with a lightness that was decidedly fake, "Have you seen Mari-?"

"No," Malik interjected abruptly, looking away, "Haven't seen him."

Yuugi nodded in understanding and offered him a small smile that spoke volumes. _Don't be afraid. We're here for you._

Malik sighed and smiled reluctantly, contemplating just how lucky he really was.

Just then, he heard the tinkle of the bell as a customer entered the shop. He blinked out of his reminiscing and looked up to see if they needed anything. They strode right up to the counter to look him in the face, and he was astonished to see a familiar head of snowy white hair.

"Ryou?" he questioned before his shock quickly gave way to delight – it was really rare for the white-haired teen to venture into North Domino these days, "What brings you here today-?"

His question became a startled yelp as the deceptively slender teen shot out a hand, grabbed his collar and practically hauled him over the counter towards him. Only then did he notice the blazing anger in those deep brown eyes.

"_You told him where I work_," Ryou hissed, face inches from his, that uncharacteristic fury still emanating strongly from every pore. Malik's lavender eyes widened and his heart sank like a stone. He didn't even need to ask who Ryou was talking about.

"He went?" he asked in dread, "He went looking for you?"

"I don't know _what _he was playing at," Ryou snapped, releasing his grip on his shirt and pushing him back none-too-gently, "All I know is that he showed up out of the blue, almost lost me my job and most likely cost me half my night's wages. But that's not even the _point_-! You promised you wouldn't tell anyone. _Ever._"

"I'm sorry," Malik said honestly, "I didn't think-"

"Well _that's _obvious," Ryou said frostily.

"What are you guys talking about?" Yuugi asked, looking somewhat alarmed by this stormy entrance, "That 'Angels' Lot' place?"

Ryou paled.

"You told them too?" he said in horror, the expression of sheer betrayal on his face cutting Malik deep, "Malik, I thought I could _trust _you-!"

"You can!" the blonde interjected desperately, hurrying around the counter to stand next to him, "I didn't tell Yuugi, I swear."

Ryou glowered at him scathingly before looking towards Yuugi with a questioning expression.

"That guy…Kazuma…he told me and Atemu," the smaller teen explained quietly, only now seeming to realise that it had been no accident that he'd never known Ryou's employment status, "That day we came to see you."

Ryou looked at him blankly for a moment before seeming to shrink and close inside himself, covering his eyes with one gloved hand.

"Ryou, it's not that big a deal," Malik said gently, "We all know you don't work there because you _want _to. And we also know you'd never do anything…untoward."

"Really?" the white-haired teen demanded, snapping to life again, "_He _didn't seem to have that impression. He called me…he said I was…he…"

He couldn't say it. He didn't need to.

"Shit…" Malik said softly, "Ryou, I'm sorry…"

"Why did you tell him?" he asked dully.

"I don't know…" Malik said, shrugging desperately, "I didn't think it was such a big secret anymore. I didn't think he'd cause trouble for you."

"Then you obviously don't know him very well," Ryou said icily, "Or have you forgotten how badly he screwed you over during Battle City?"

"He didn't _really_…" Malik began to protest before deciding that rushing to Bakura's defence probably _wouldn't _be a very strategic move right now. Ryou glared at him, tight-lipped, and Malik got the strong feeling that he wanted to hit him. Well, why not? He'd messed up kind of badly. He'd been trying to _help, _but obviously Bakura had had other ideas. He must have been crazy to expect anything else. He found he couldn't even meet Ryou's furious, my-trust-in-you-is-shattered gaze as he contemplated his general failings as a friend.

"Look, Ryou, can we take this back-shop?" he asked carefully, knowing it was only a matter of time before a customer appeared - and an ongoing argument in the middle of the puzzle section was _not_ going to be conducive for business. And, more importantly, he hadn't had a chance to sit down and just _talk _with Ryou for a long time.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Ryou said fiercely, "Am I causing a _scene?_"

"_No, _it's just-"

"Forget it," he said shortly, "I don't even know why I came all the way here. I was just going to phone you and bite your head off, but…well, I needed a walk anyway."

He turned on his heel to leave, but Malik reached out and caught his arm firmly.

"You're not exactly dressed for the weather," he commented in a (probably blatant) attempt to stall and eventually placate him. It was true, though: the sidewalks outside were coated in a slick sheet of ice, icing-sugar frost laced plants and windowpanes, and a biting wind was blowing. And whilst Ryou looked well wrapped-up at first glance, it was just an illusion – on closer inspection his jacket could be seen to be made of nothing but thin grey canvas, and he didn't appear to be wearing anything very substantial underneath it (given away by the obvious lack of padding on his skinny frame). On his lower half he wore dark jeans and a pair of trainers that undoubtedly offered no protection against the cold and wet of the omnipresent ice. He had gloves and a scarf, but what good were they? If the rest of you was frozen, gloves and a scarf weren't going to warm you up.

"Don't fuss, Malik," Ryou said with a frown.

"Someonehas to," he informed him curtly, but with a faint twinkle returning to his eye, "Come on, it must be below zero out there. And it's not like you have an abundance of body fat to rely on."

Ryou still looked annoyed, but his lips twitched involuntarily as he fought down a smile – probably imagining himself fat. Malik felt sad as he remembered how easy it used to be to make him smile.

"Come on, stick around," he pleaded, "I haven't seen you in ages. You isolate yourself. And if you stay you can yell at me some more."

He jokingly let that little piece of temptation dangle in the air, but Ryou was shaking his head and stepping away from him.

"I shouldn't have come…" he murmured, backing away as if he were _afraid_, "I…"

He couldn't finish, however, because at that precise moment the store-room door burst open, revealing Atemu, Sugoroku and Otogi.

"Ryou!" Sugoroku said in cheerful surprise, approaching said teen where he stood in apparent shock and clapping him on the shoulder (having to reach up a considerable distance to do so), "It's been too long. It's nice of you to come and visit."

Ryou smiled weakly.

"This calls for tea and a chat," the jovial old man continued merrily, "I think you're due a break anyway, Malik. You look like you could use a little caffeine in you. Would you mind manning the desk, Otogi?"

"Sure," the black-haired youth replied, looking rather amused by this whole scene.

"Come along then, everyone. You can take your jacket off, you know, Ryou. Or…are you not staying?"

Sugoroku Mutou was not a remotely threatening personage, but there was something oddly dangerous about that question. It was as if the remark had been left unfinished, the unspoken final part being something along the lines of 'Because if you're not staying I'm going to have to tie you up and keep you in a cupboard somewhere until you accept our hospitality'. Malik bit back a laugh. He'd really come to love this old guy.

"Of course he's staying," the blonde grinned, "Right, Ryou?"

The white-haired teen shot him a scathing, 'You will _pay_, Malik Ishtar' look. He returned it with a blasé smile, making it perfectly clear that he had no regrets whatsoever.

* * *

_**End chapter.**_

_**I'm glad this chapter finally got back to some characters who are not Ryou and Bakura…**_

_**In case anyone's wondering, the events of Ryou's dream didn't occur on the day that Kul Elna was destroyed. It wasn't made very clear, but the men on the horses (one of which was Akhenadin) were there to sort of 'inspect' the village and decide if it was suitable for the ritual. It isn't long before the massacre, though. (Sad face)**_

_**Wow. It seems like chapter 7 was really popular? It got so many reviews xD I was so happy!**_

_**Big fat thank yous go out to Niilan, The Lunar Rainbow, Twilight-Imp-626, AnimeLoverAngel, mystralwind, saturnoutlaw, Kiri-chan220, ONIX-21, Thief of Spades, Silver Tears 11, chibi heishi, shadowrealm818, pride1289, , RyouLoverForever, Ask the Lonely, Thief Mistress Thorn, athrun zala08, Pork Steak the Grande, Ceilo, gliitch, Rannaty, IsItMeantToDoThat?, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, lalalah, millenniumthief, Steamcry and Schizo-of-Destiny. Love you lots like jelly tots :]**_

_**I wonder if we can beat chapter 7's record…? :P**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	9. Tiny Little Fractures

_**Chapter 9**__**: Tiny Little Fractures**_

They crowded into the small staffroom and Sugoroku bustled off to make the tea and coffee. Ryou slid unhappily out of his ineffective-looking jacket, and Malik winced to see that he was indeed only wearing a thin, pale blue cotton polo-neck underneath. He tugged his scarf and gloves off too, and his fingers were white with the cold, his nails bordering on blue. They started to flush a more healthy pink in the sudden heat of the shop, though, with his pale cheeks starting to also take on the same rosy hue.

"Gods…" Malik muttered to him as he hovered at the edge of the room awkwardly, "Get yourself a winter coat, huh?"

"You're not off the hook yet, you know," Ryou returned lowly, effectively quietening him. Malik sighed exasperatedly and directed him over to the moss-green sofa in the centre of the room – anything to stop him shuffling from foot to foot, looking like he'd rather be anywhere but here.

Ryou sat there as directed, his back poker-straight. Sugoroku served out the beverages and chatted idly and Ryou smiled politely and didn't say a word. Malik wished he'd stop it. He wanted to reach over and shake him and shout at him to just stop it. He hated that smile. It wasn't real. It was so forced, so plastic. Painted on. A clown's smile.

Atemu hadn't followed them here, Malik suddenly realised. Sugoroku and Yuugi chattered for a while longer about nothing in particular – then Yuugi commented that they were running low on milk and dashed off to find some more, while Sugoroku said he'd go and fetch a fresh packet of biscuits. When ten minutes passed and neither of them had returned, Malik realised that they weren't coming back.

"Oh…" he said, tucking his feet underneath him and twisting round to face the white-haired teen, "It seems we've been set up."

"Really?" Ryou replied dully. His hands were clasped too tightly in his lap, and his face was drawn and closed, like a shut blind. He looked so uncomfortable, here in this place that had become like a second home for Malik, in this place where, really, he belonged infinitely more than anywhere in daunting South Domino.

"I really am sorry," Malik said earnestly, since it was very clear that he was far from forgiven, "I guess I just…wasn't thinking. I was stupid. I thought maybe Bakura would have developed a shred of conscience, now that he's human again. I honestly didn't think he'd use anything I told him to hurt you."

"Then you were _very _stupid," Ryou informed him bluntly, "He's the exact same as he was before, if not worse. I knew as much the moment I saw him. I _told _you this. Why were you telling him about me, anyway?"

"He asked," Malik said with a helpless shrug, "I meant no harm."

"But why were you _talking _to him? Why were you even _near _him?"

There was a desperation in Ryou's tone – as if he just couldn't believe what he was hearing and hoped now to disprove it through meticulous questioning.

"Why so surprised?" Malik enquired, smiling faintly despite himself, "I was near him because a certain Ryou Bakura phoned me up on Wednesday evening and asked me to go and look for him."

Ryou flushed slightly.

"I _asked _you to make sure he wasn't dead," he retorted, looking away, "Not to befriend him and spill all the gory details of my life to him. Gods, maybe I _should _have just left him to die…he _deserves _to die."

His pale hands had curled into tight, knotted fists. Malik shifted unhappily, not liking hearing him talk this way – full of anger and vengeance – because it really wasn't like him, and only served to prove the adverse effect Bakura's presence was having on him.

"He did die, Ryou," he reminded him, "He's been dead three years. Hasn't he paid a little penance?"

"He feels no remorse," Ryou said flatly, "In his mind, he has no penance to pay. He either doesn't think he's done anything wrong, or he knows he has and is just plain delighted about it."

Malik sighed heavily, feeling like a child caught between warring parents.

"Will you never forgive him…?" he asked despondently.

"He doesn't want to be forgiven," Ryou replied, then he frowned and his eyes flashed angrily, "But why do you think I should? What reason do you see for me to forgive and forget?"

"No, I don't…there's no reason…" Malik murmured, looking away.

There was a pause in which Ryou regarded him almost suspiciously.

"Do you like him, Malik?" he asked at length. Malik laughed.

"I wouldn't go quite that far," he said, "I know as well as anyone what a bastard he can be. But I don't hate him, either. I can't quite find it in me to hate him."

"Why?" Ryou asked, looking slightly hurt. Malik realised he must have sounded rather dismissive of what the poor teen had been through.

"I know he's done terrible things, and there's no excuse for that…" he said slowly, "But…you know. I did terrible things too. And I got another chance."

"That was different…" Ryou started to protest.

"Was it?"

"You…what your father did to you," he mumbled, "And Mariku, and…it wasn't your fault."

"It was," Malik said plaintively, "Maybe my past can justify…no, not justify, _explain _why I acted that way, but it was still my fault. And I think Bakura might be the same."

"What do you mean?"

Malik chewed his lower lip reflectively for a moment.

"Yuugi and the others never really told me what they saw in the Memory World," he said finally, "But I'm willing to bet there was some…_reason _that Bakura held a grudge against Pharaoh, and wanted the Millennium Items."

"Didn't he want to summon some demon or other?" Ryou muttered darkly.

"Zorc Necrophades," Malik informed him, "But, again, he must have had a serious motive. People don't try and destroy the world they live in for no reason."

"Did they teach you that at college?" Ryou asked, folding his arms.

"Yes, that was a fascinating lecture," Malik said, rolling his eyes before becoming serious again, "I think something bad happened to him, and it's never been allowed to heal."

Ryou considered.

"Some people are just evil," he said at length, "They don't need a reason. They just want power, and to hurt people."

"That's true," Malik conceded, "But I don't think he's one of them."

"You didn't have him stuck in your head for five years," Ryou said bitterly.

"That's also true," Malik said with a slight smile.

"I don't want to know his tragedy," Ryou said determinedly, "I don't want to learn something that makes him pitiable. A sad story might make me stop hating him."

Malik looked at him unhappily.

"Is hating him better? Are you still afraid of him?" he asked, "Even a little?"

"I'm afraid of what might happen if our lives become involved," Ryou said quietly.

"I think he's afraid of you," Malik commented. Ryou looked at him in surprise.

"What?" he asked.

"Since I blew one of your secrets to him, I might as well do it vice versa…" the blonde said, "I honestly think he's scared by you, in his way. He said that he believes you could kill him, if you chose to. He'd never have said that before."

Ryou's face was bewildered, making him look a little like his old self.

"He was so cruel last night…" he murmured, "He didn't seem afraid at all."

"I doubt he'd ever show it," Malik said, "Showing any kind of weakness to you would probably be too much for him to bear."

Ryou gave a small, sad sigh.

"He's with you, isn't he?" he said. It was more of a statement than a question, but Malik felt he should answer anyway.

"Yes, he is," he said unflinchingly, "I guess I couldn't bring myself to leave him at the mercy of the Domino streets."

"That either gives you the moral high-ground, or makes you crazy," Ryou said, "What if he hurts you?"

"I know he won't."

"You 'knew' he wouldn't hurt me," Ryou pointed out, suddenly reaching out and grabbing his hand, "Malik, _please_. I don't want you to get hurt."

Malik stared at Ryou's pale, bony hand desperately clasping his, like a child pleading for something, like words alone just weren't enough to express his feeling. At length he took both of his own hands and closed them gently around that tense, trembling one of Ryou's.

"Don't worry about me," he said with an imploring smile, "Bakura's a cruel bastard, but he's not stupid. He knows if he tries any of his shit with me, his ass will be right back on the streets. Besides, I can handle myself."

Ryou's eyes narrowed and he snatched his hand away.

"And I can't?" he said shortly, folding his skinny arms again.

"I didn't say that," Malik said with a frustrated sigh, copying the motion, "Come on, we both know you're more street-wise than any of us these days, and you're independent to the point of me wishing you _weren't._"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ryou demanded.

"I mean that anything could happen to you and I wouldn't know about it until the police came knocking at my door three weeks later," he elaborated with some accusation in his voice, "You distance yourself completely, like you can't even stand to be near me, or any of us…"

"It's not like that," Ryou said defensively, half-rising from his seat.

"Will you stop getting angry whenever I say something that touches on the truth?" Malik snapped, also getting to his feet, his own still-very-much-in-existence anger coming to the surface.

"You're being unreasonable," the white-haired teen said heatedly, "I don't have time to come here and mess around, I'm working and I'm studying-"

"We're all working and studying,"Malik shot back at him, "I'm at college, for God's sake, but I can still find time for people-"

"Don't compare _your _life to mine," Ryou said furiously, "If you think I'm in basically the same situation as _you, _then you're even _blinder _than I thought-!"

"You've got one hell of a temper these days, you know that?" Malik said darkly. Ryou visibly faltered – he knew that, when the Egyptian teen's voice took on that dangerously calm tone, it was a definite sign that he was _really _pissed off.

"That's not true-" he started to protest.

"Yeah it is. It's like you're always just about to _snap,_" Malik said plaintively, eyes slightly narrowed,"And you sound just like _him, _sometimes, when you lose it."

"Malik, stop it-"

"That's what it's like, Ryou! It's like Bakura when he's angry, the way he just lashes out-!"

"_Stop it!_"

That hoarse scream, tearing from Ryou's throat like the wail of a distressed child, cut Malik short. The red mist of anger faded from his eyes, and he saw the white-haired teen with his hands over his ears. In the ensuing silence Ryou slowly returned to a normal stance, and then turned and stepped away, as if to run off.

"Wait…" Malik sighed, reaching out and catching his hand. The other teen tried to pull away, but Malik stepped forward and wrapped his arms around him securely, as much from affection and guilt as a means of keeping him still.

"Sorry, Ryou…" he said quietly.

"Shut up, shut up…" Ryou choked out over and over like a mantra, going rigid in his grasp, "I'm…I'm not like him. Don't say I'm like him. Please, say anything but that, anything, but not that…"

"I'm sorry," Malik said again, "It's ok."

Ryou's entire frame gave a violent shudder and he suddenly seemed very small to Malik, even felt smaller in his arms. His shoulders were trembling, almost as if he was crying, but he wasn't because Ryou never cried now. Not ever.

Malik sighed again, sitting back down on the sofa and tugging the other teen down with him. He didn't let go of him, because for some reason he felt like Ryou might just fall apart if he did. Ryou buried his face into the crook of his neck, as if he just wanted to hide – as if he couldn't face his unpleasant world anymore.

Malik heard the door creak open slightly and, looking up, saw Yuugi's concerned face peeking in, having apparently heard that little confrontation. He gave him a reassuring 'it's all under control' smile, and the smaller teen nodded and shut the door again.

"I thought I was safe…" Ryou mumbled, "After _three years _I thought I was free of him forever…but…but he just _appeared_-!"

"I know, I know…"

They sat like that for what seemed like a long time, Ryou letting some of his pent-up misery and frustration leak out and Malik offering comfort in the simplest way he knew. He wished they hadn't had to fight, especially since they hadn't seen each other in such a long time. In fact, he could barely recall the last time he and Ryou had even spoken before that out-of-the-blue phone-call on Wednesday.

_BLEEP. Hi, this is Malik – I'm not home,__ or I'm ignoring the phone, so leave a message-_

"_Malik. Are you there? Pick up the phone. Please. Malik, he's back…"_

_Malik almost choked on a mouthful of fries and lunged for the phone at that voice._

"_Ryou, is that you?" he gaped._

"_Yes. Please, listen…__**he's **__back. Bakura. He's back, with a body and everything…"_

"_**Shit**__, you didn't know? Pharaoh was talking about it earlier…"_

"_He's back too? Is there some kind of big reunion I don't know about?"_

_Ryou's voice was bordering on hysterical, going a fair few octaves above its normal level._

"_Ryou, are you alright? Is he causing trouble? Do you need help?"_

"…_Not exactly."_

_There was a long silence as Malik waited for him to explain._

"…_I was wondering if you'd go…look for him."_

"…_**Huh?**__" Malik gawped, now completely at a loss._

"_I'm sorry, I know it sounds bizarre, but…I just want you to look and make sure he's not…dying…"_

"_Why would he be…? Actually, never mind," Malik said, shaking his head as he pieced together what had happened, "Fine, I'll go scout around for him. I'd better go now, before it gets too dark…"_

"_Malik."_

_He stopped short at Ryou's tone._

"_Yeah?"_

"_If you find him…do __**not **__tell him I sent you."_

The blonde smiled slightly. Truth be told, he didn't really care if the spirits were back in the world of the living, if it meant Ryou wasn't going to be alone so much.

Of course, the thought of bumping into Mariku still wasn't particularly appealing to him.

"Nngh…" Ryou mumbled against his neck, "Why won't he leave me alone…?"

"I really don't know," Malik admitted, "He has absolutely nothing to gain from tormenting you, so why…?"

He felt Ryou's mouth curve into a cold smile.

"I told you," he said, "Some people don't need a reason to be evil. I think you give him too much credit."

Malik snorted to himself.

"I think you could be right," he said.

Ryou sighed and sat up slightly, reaching up with one hand to fiddle idly with one of Malik's gold earrings.

"I've missed you, y'know," he said quietly.

"Then why do you never call or come and visit?" Malik asked chidingly.

Ryou sighed again and lowered his head.

"Ryou?"

"I'm…ashamed, I guess," he murmured, "That's why I don't visit you, or Yuugi, or anyone. It hurts too much to look in your eyes and see _this _reflected back."

"Stop that. There's nothing to be ashamed of," Malik said firmly, "You do what you have to do."

Ryou laughed softly but coldly.

"That's right…I did what I had to do. I do what I have to do. And those things…they change me. Don't pretend like you haven't noticed."

"Stop it. That's not true," Malik insisted, but his conviction was wavering, "You're just the same. You've just…grown up, that's all."

Ryou looked at him sadly.

"I feel like I _am _becoming like _him_," he said, "I can't stand it, it's my worst fear, being like him, but I think it's happening…"

"No," Malik said, grasping his shoulders, but he found he could find nothing further to say to contradict this theory. He couldn't lie and say he'd never seen a disturbing flicker of Bakura in Ryou, ever since he'd recovered from that…illness those few years ago. It was as if that had been the final straw, Bakura's final act of spite towards his host, and it had left an indelible mark on him – engrained a painful shard, a tiny _sliver, _of his yami's anger and bitterness into him, only made worse by the state of his life, which did nothing to restore his faith in the world.

It was Malik's turn to sigh as he looked into those mournful brown eyes, their walls of indifference temporarily lowered while it was just the two of them. They were pleading with him to tell him that it was ok, he wasn't becoming like his darkness in any way. But Malik had lost some of his skill at lying over the years.

"Remember, Ryou," he said instead, "The only one who can decide who you are is you. Circumstances can make it hard, but in the end, you shape who you become."

Ryou opened his mouth to reply, but the words seemed to catch in his throat and he started coughing rather violently. This served to lighten the mood considerably, and Malik laughed and batted him around the head playfully, already feeling a little embarrassed about that burst of philosophy.

"See, now you're coming down with a cold," he mock-scolded, "I'm telling you, get a decent coat."

"It's not…a cold," Ryou said stubbornly in between coughs, his eyes starting to water, "Just…this damn cough…"

Malik's smile faded slightly.

"Just a cough?" he asked apprehensively, "Nothing else? You haven't been dizzy or…?"

"No," Ryou said steadfastly, "Just a silly cough."

"You're sure? I mean, you know how things can suddenly-"

"Malik, don't _fuss_!" Ryou groaned, but he was smiling, and it was less fake than before. Malik smiled too, and apologised for being such a worry-wart.

They fell to talking about more normal things – mostly from Malik's day-to-day life, since Ryou didn't really have a whole lot of normality to share. He did speak a little about Kazuma and Mio – neither of whom Malik had ever met, but Ryou had told him about them a few times before – and once or twice approached the subject of Mariku, but Malik directed him carefully away from that and he obliged without question.

For a while it was just like old times – but only for a while.

"I think you're missing your shift, Malik," Ryou said suddenly, "Shouldn't you be getting back?"

"Probably," he agreed, looking at the clock with regret.

"I need to go, anyway," Ryou said, getting to his feet, "I have work later…assuming I still have a job, of course."

Malik's spirits sank. The white-haired teen had already raised his protective barriers again. There was no reaching him now.

"Look after yourself, Ryou," he said, "And keep in touch, huh?"

"I'll try," Ryou replied, his plastic-clown-smile sliding back into place, and Malik suspected he was lying. The white-haired teen tugged on his pathetic excuse for a jacket, gathered up his gloves and scarf, and they exited the room. On the way out Ryou thanked Sugoroku for the coffee he hadn't drank, said a quick farewell to Yuugi and Otogi and shot Atemu a very, very forced smile. And then he was gone, back out in that merciless winter that he had so little protection against. Malik suddenly realised that any time he said goodbye to Ryou could easily be the last time.

"Did he forgive you?" Yuugi asked smilingly, breaking his morbid train of thought.

"It's kind of difficult to tell," he replied, "But he seemed to let it go."

"What exactly was the problem?" Atemu asked, "I gather it was something to do with Bakura, but…"

"Basically, Bakura was giving Ryou undue hassle at work," Malik said, mentally planning to hang, draw and quarter the Thief later, "Honestly, how pathetic can you get…?"

"But…I don't understand," Atemu said, expression clouding over, "If Bakura was causing trouble at Ryou's…'work'…why is that your fault?"

"Because I, stupidly, told him where Ryou works," Malik said, palming his forehead, "He might have been able to find it anyway, with that connection thing they have, but…still. I'm surprised he went after Ryou again so soon, actually…I mean, he was in a bit of mess from their last encounter…"

He suddenly noticed that the room had gone completely, deathly silent, and all eyes were on him.

"You've seen him," Atemu said in realisation.

Malik winced inwardly as his mistake registered in his mind.

"…Yeah," he said at length, looking at the floor.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Yuugi asked disbelievingly.

"It's only been a few days…and he hasn't cropped up in conversation much until now…" the blonde said with a shrug, eyes wandering awkwardly.

"Are you trying to say you just _forgot _to mention him?"

"_No, _I…"

"Where is he, Malik?"

There was another silence as Malik stared blankly at Atemu.

"What?" he said finally.

"Where is Bakura?" the Pharaoh repeated, "You know where he is, don't you?"

Malik hesitated.

"Yes," he said carefully, "But I can't tell you."

"Why not?" Atemu asked incredulously.

"Because I told him I wouldn't say," he said, wringing his hands agitatedly, "I told him that unless it was really important, I wouldn't say…"

"Don't you think this is important?"

"No…I mean, yes, but…I told him…"

"_Whose side are you on, anyway?_"

Malik froze at that voice. Turning around slowly, he saw Otogi looking at him darkly, his eyes like twin hard slices of emerald. And those eyes held something that no one here had looked at him with in a long time: suspicion. Otogi wasn't the only one, either, he realised – Atemu, Yuugi, and Sugoroku: they were all watching him doubtfully, their trust in him seeming to be in serious jeopardy. He knew that, for the first time in years, they were thinking back to Battle City, back to how he'd teamed up with Bakura, fought alongside him and raised hell. And he knew what they were asking themselves: _Is he going to do it again?_

He felt like there was a spotlight on him as they awaited his response – a big sign round his neck labelling him a traitor and a no-good turncoat. Still, he stood up tall and looked Atemu in the face.

"I won't tell you where he is, Pharaoh," he said, keeping his voice steady, "Because there's no point in you and him seeing each other. What good would it do if you sought him out? He wouldn't talk rationally with you, or take your advice – you'd just end up fighting again," he paused and took a breath, "And that wouldn't help anything."

And with that he turned away from them and their accusing eyes and set to work labelling items in the stockroom.

He didn't speak to any of them for the rest of the day.

* * *

_**End chapter.**__** It looks like angstshipping. But it's not, I swear.**_

_**Aha, the plot thickens. Slightly. Not really.**_

_**Malik really does seem very wise in this story. So far.**_

_**Huge thanks you's go out to millenniumthief, gliitch, Niilan, RyouLoverForever, Chrys, ONIX-21, Ceilo, CoCoBookmark, AnimeLoverAngel, XionItachi, pride1289, The Lunar Rainbow, , Twilight-Imp-626, chibi heishi, liztheyiaoaddict, Sirithdiliel, Thief Mistress Thorn, Pharaohdeli, felton0fanatic, Jaybird4909, Schizo-of-Destiny, Merina, Wannaseemymoon, MissTreason, Streamcry, stevenlover101, Franklyn, Phaenilix and XxAlysxX. You are all my sunshines :]**_

_**Wow, you guys really did beat chapter 7's record xD Well done! Fight on? .**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver**_


	10. Something Bad

_**Chapter 10**__**: Something Bad**_

Bakura blinked and looked up with vague interest when he heard the front door open. He'd been lounging on the sofa, looking through one of Malik's psychology textbooks (and had swiftly drawn the conclusion that these books gave the human mind _way _too much credit) but quickly set it on the coffee table and pushed it away from him as the blonde came inside and shut the door behind him.

"Welcome back," he said without much enthusiasm, stretching and yawning. For a brief second it had crossed his mind to say 'welcome home', and that disturbed him ever so slightly.

Malik didn't reply. He crossed the room without a word and leaned over the back of the sofa to look down at the reclining Thief, and he had a look in his lavender eyes that Bakura wasn't sure about. Since he'd been here, Malik's look had always been either deadly serious and grave, or full to burst with teasing humour. Right now it appeared conflicted – somewhere in between, as if he wanted to scream and rail at him and then just laugh and tell him he'd only been joking.

"You're an asshole, you know that?" the blonde said finally with a sigh that sent the sandy tresses around his face fluttering. Bakura blinked his mahogany red-brown eyes languidly, a little puzzled.

"Yes," he said at length, sitting up slightly. Malik gave another heavy sigh.

"As long as you know…" he mumbled, flopping onto the sofa – but, Bakura noticed, not boldly right next to him, not in his customary 'how long till I make you crack?' manner. He sensed he was not in favour.

"For what particular reason am I an asshole today?" he asked casually, craning his neck backwards over the armrest in boredom and looking at the room upside-down with mild amusement.

"Don't act like you don't know," he heard Malik snap.

"Actually, I don't have the faintest idea," he said, looking up at the ceiling instead when his neck started to hurt, "So fire away."

"Gods, you are a prick…" Malik muttered, "Ok, fine. Here's why. I did not tell you where Ryou works so that you could go and mess with him."

At the mention of Ryou, Bakura abruptly lost interest in looking around the room.

"What?" he asked, sitting up properly.

"Didn't think I'd find out, did you?" Malik said with a dry smile, "You forget that Ryou and I are friends. Or at least we were, until he figured out I let slip to you about Angels' Lot."

Bakura snorted and glowered at the ceiling.

"I guess I should have known he'd go crying to you," he muttered darkly.

"Crying to me? Guess again," Malik snapped, "I'm getting half the blame for whatever the hell _you _did."

Bakura glanced at him, evidently surprised.

"He was angry at you?" he questioned.

"Yes, ever so slightly," Malik said irritably, "But he's even more pissed off at you, so don't get smug. What did you _do, _anyway? Must have been really shitty if it made Ryou mad enough to come all the way-"

"You mean he didn't tell you?" Bakura interrupted, looking stunned.

"_No_, he didn't. He's not some whiny cry-baby. He came to ask me why I broke my promise, not to re-enact your latest act of unnecessary cruelty."

Bakura looked away, and for the briefest of moments Malik thought he appeared almost ashamed.

"…Your promise?" he questioned quietly at length.

"Yeah," Malik said, eyes downcast, "He made me promise I'd never tell anyone about his work. It's not something he's proud of."

"I wonder why…" Bakura muttered. Malik groaned.

"Damnit, Bakura, why did you have to…? I mean, what was the point in-?"

"Why did you tell me about that place if you didn't want me to go there?" Bakura shot back at him – as if he could actually make his deeds the blonde's fault. Malik slumped forward, elbows on his knees, head in his hands.

"I _did_ want you to go," he said miserably, "Don't you get it? I didn't want you to hurt him again. I wanted you to go and…I don't know, fix things-"

"Goddamnit, why does everyone think I want to do that?" Bakura snarled, kicking the coffee table savagely. The book fell off.

"Don't you?" Malik questioned.

"_No_."

"Then what _do _you want to do?" Malik demanded, getting up and retrieving his book, "Come on. You want _something _from Ryou. You ask me about him, you think about him all the time – don't deny it –, you go looking for him even though you know he might kill you. What are you hoping to gain?"

"I don't know!" Bakura thundered, standing up and towering over him, "I don't know what the hell I want from him. I don't even know why I went to that _place _last night, ok? But I didn't go there because I _wanted _to hurt him," he clenched his hands into fists, face burning with the shame and weakness of this confession, "I know that."

Malik's violet eyes met his evenly, with no trace of fear. Bakura suddenly realised that the blonde teen was the first person in centuries to look upon him without fear, hate or disgust.

"If you didn't want to hurt him, why did you?" he challenged. Bakura exhaled noisily and flopped back onto the sofa.

"You weren't there," he muttered, "You didn't see…there was this guy. A customer. And he kept _touching _him."

"What?" Malik questioned, looking unnerved.

"You were right when you said the bastards in that place wouldn't settle for just talking," Bakura said darkly, "So I grabbed the brat. Dragged him away from it. He probably got into trouble over it. Maybe that's what he's employed for, I don't know. But don't pretend like you wouldn't have done the same. You would, if you'd seen it. You're his _friend_, right?"

The last remark was thrown in scathingly, but Malik didn't seem to hear it. He appeared extremely perturbed, but also thoughtful.

"So you helped him…" he said slowly, "He probably didn't appreciate that. But that wasn't what made him most angry. Today…there was an implication that…you said some cruel things. Treated him cruelly, like always."

"Of course I did," Bakura snapped, "It would never occur to me to treat him, or anyone, _kindly._"

"Even if you wanted to?" Malik suggested.

Bakura didn't reply. The Egyptian teen sighed.

"Gods, Bakura," he said quietly, sitting down next to him again, "You just don't know how to be any other way, do you…?"

The white-haired yami grunted, turning his head away.

"Why are you like this?" Malik asked carefully, "Seriously. There must be a reason."

Bakura looked back at him, harsh amusement in his hard eyes.

"You want to analyse me, Ishtar?" he questioned, "Figure me out?"

"I want to _understand _you," Malik said with a frown, stressing the word to make it very clear that there was a big difference, "Even just a little."

Bakura was about to bark with sneering laughter at such a suggestion, but then he paused and looked more closely at the slight blonde teen. Malik's lavender eyes were narrowed in a stubborn and head-strong fashion, but his expression held no desire to accuse or condemn – but instead a genuine curiosity, a willingness to _listen_ without prejudice, and a wish to properly comprehend what could cause a human soul to be twisted beyond redemption. Faced by this chance to truly be heard by another person – a person who wasn't merely looking for a reason to scorn and ostracise him –, Bakura faltered, uncertain. He'd never told his story before. Perhaps he'd coldly thrown the missing details to the Pharaoh during their battle in Egypt, but he'd never actually let himself open up to a fellow human being and pour out his whole awful tale. His internalisation of the legacy of Kul Elna and the feelings it had left him with had probably contributed to his bitterness and isolation from the rest of his species.

"Alright, Ishtar," he said with a harsh chuckle, "You want to hear the Thief's side of the story? I'll talk, then."

Malik raised a sandy-blonde eyebrow suspiciously, having obviously not expected him to agree to this so easily.

"No lies, Bakura," he said warningly.

"No," he agreed, eyes half closing, "It's really time someone heard the truth."

It wasn't easy. Bakura wasn't the greatest talker, except when it came to threats and curses: in Egypt, no one had wanted to listen to a vagrant child, a pre-teen pick-pocket or an adolescent tomb-robber, and in the end his capacity for communication had all but shrivelled away. Adding further to his difficulty here was the tenderness of the subject matter. Time had not healed the wounds he had acquired at Kul Elna. They were merely covered by a thin scab of poison and spite. And he knew that, the moment he started talking about this, remembering it, feeling it, that protective scab would just break, and he'd bleed.

He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. His throat felt clogged. This story had been buried inside of him for centuries – to just let it out would be like causing an explosion. He could already feel the pressure building at the back of his eyes as he called even the barest details to his mind. He felt a surge of despair at the thought that he might never be able to tell the story, and the truth would be lost forever.

Malik laid a hand on his arm.

Bakura stared down at the tanned appendage as it rested lightly on his forearm in what was clearly meant as a comforting gesture. Upon noticing his disbelieving gaze, Malik hastily drew back, looking embarrassed – it was as if he had momentarily forgotten who he was talking to. Bakura couldn't help but marvel at how much the young Egyptian really had changed in the time he'd been gone – this boy sitting next to him now, instinctively seeking to ease his inner struggle; was this really Malik Ishtar, the cold, calculating teen who had wanted to enslave all his rivals and who scoffed at mercy and kindness? Could three years really reform a person so very much?

Then he remembered the bitter, hateful look on Ryou's face when he'd stood over him, baseball bat in hand, and he decided, yes, three years could do that.

For some reason, talking became a little easier after that. Perhaps it was because he now knew that this Malik would not mock his tale – he didn't know. But out it came – slowly at first, in short dribs and drabs, starts and stops – and finally the dam broke, and everything that had been so painfully suppressed came flowing out, like a river breaking free with a sigh of relief. His memory of the massacre was as vivid and sharp as ever – he saw it happen again as he described it. But his voice was flat and detached, hardly shaking, and his eyes were fixed firmly on the opposite wall as he spoke of the fire, the screaming, the blood. His mind was transported back to Kul Elna's final night – he didn't see how Malik's expression was caught between rapt and horrified, or how his violet eyes were wide with shock and dismay.

Bakura made sure not to exaggerate anything, and put as little of his own feeling into the story as he could – it had to be the plain truth that was heard and, really, that required no exaggeration or superfluous emotion to stupefy any listener.

He suddenly realised he could stop talking – Malik knew the rest. Mostly. He sat silently for a few moments, feeling strangely numb with the shock that the story had been told, and he wasn't carrying it around inside his body like a lodged bullet anymore. It still hurt, of course, it always would. But it felt…different. A little lighter.

"Only you survived?" Malik asked quietly, snapping Bakura out of his reverie.

"Only me," he confirmed, and his voice was dead even to his own ears.

"That must have been so lonely…" the Egyptian teen said forlornly, "How did you…?"

"I stole," Bakura said bluntly. They both knew it wasn't the answer to the question Malik had been about to ask, but the blonde said nothing more for a few moments.

"But I don't understand," he said at length, "The Pharaoh knowsthis happened?"

"Yes," Bakura replied shortly.

"But…how could he possibly know?" Malik said, shaking his head, "I know you hate him, but the Pharaoh isn't evil…"

"Evil is all about how you look at things," Bakura said vacantly, not looking at him.

"There's no way he can know," Malik went on, "Not that version, anyway. How could he fight you, knowing that…?"

"That _version_?" Bakura repeated with a snarl. Malik looked at him defensively.

"There's more than one side to every-" he started.

"Damn you, don't tell me I'm lying!" Bakura roared, pulling his newly-stolen knife from his belt and all but holding it to the blonde's throat, "If you _dare _say I'm lying-!"

He faltered, however, when he saw the pity and confusion in Malik's eyes.

"Are you going to kill me, Bakura?" he asked lowly, "Will that make it better?"

Bakura looked at what he was doing, and for the first time he could remember, he felt horribly ashamed. The knife seemed a monstrous thing, and he cast it away from him in revulsion, only then noticing how his hands shook. The blade lay glinting gleefully on the floor.

"Malik, I-" he started.

"It's alright," the teen informed him, violet eyes on the carpet between his feet.

"It's just…no one ever believed…" Bakura pressed on, desperately trying to explain himself coherently, "So…no one…"

"I said it's alright," Malik repeated, "I know how it must feel. No, I don't. It's too terrible for me to even imagine. But I know that kind of pain can make people do crazy things," he paused and looked guiltily to the side, "Terrible things."

Bakura nodded in sombre understanding.

"I do believe you," Malik added, swinging his legs and kicking the sofa with his heels in an awkward fashion that wasn't like him.

Bakura nodded again.

"Ryou doesn't know," he said abruptly, not sure why he felt the need to state the fact. The name sounded strange as he said it, as it always did. Malik looked as though he'd known already.

"Will you tell him?" the blonde teen asked quietly.

"No," Bakura said immediately.

"Why not?"

"Don't tell him," Bakura said with a dark glower.

"I won't," Malik assured him, "It's not my place. I know now that telling either of you anything about the other isn't my place. But why won't you tell him? He wouldn't accept it as an excuse for everything you've done. But it might help him understand."

"I don't need him to 'understand'," Bakura snapped, "I'm not grovelling for his forgiveness, am I? My past has nothing to do with Ry-"

The name caught in his throat and he scowled. Malik looked at him wonderingly.

"That was the first time I've heard you say his name, just there," he said at length, "Does it hurt to say it?"

"Shut up."

Malik raised an eyebrow.

"Does it make him too real?" he questioned.

Bakura looked away.

"Let me guess," he muttered, "Psychology."

Malik smiled, letting the conversation drift onto this slightly easier ground.

"What you call a person, and how you say it, speaks volumes," he said, pulling his feet onto the sofa and sitting cross-legged, "You usually call me Malik, right?"

"Right…" Bakura agreed with some suspicion.

"Uh huh, so…" Malik said, thinking for a moment, "Hah, it's an easy one. It's informal and uncomplicated – you consider us to be on even ground. You don't talk up or down to me. You've nothing to prove to me, and you don't expect me to prove anything to you either."

"I call you Malik because that's _your name_," Bakura said in annoyance, but that heavy feeling of numbness started to lift.

"And when you call me 'Ishtar' it's because you're embarrassed," Malik went on relentlessly, eyes teasing, "Or nervous, or irritated. It's a form of self-defence. Helps you feel authoritative. In control."

"Bullshit," Bakura muttered.

"Then we have Ryou," Malik continued, becoming more serious and thoughtful, "Hm. Around here, you refer to him as 'the brat'."

His mouth twisted from side to side as he mulled this over, making Bakura extremely apprehensive.

"You're trying to 'un-face' him," Malik said finally, "It's called deindividuation. You don't want to think of him as a person, and especially not as the person he is. If you make yourself think of him as a two-dimensional personality stereotype – like a 'brat' – you can dismiss him as unimportant, and it makes it easier for you to deal with…" he trailed off and frowned, as if just making a revelation, "With feelings that you can't control. I wonder. Guilt, regret?"

"You think too much, Ish-" Bakura caught himself, "Malik."

"What do you call him to his face?" Malik asked, clearly getting quite into this, "Not 'brat', I hope."

"No," Bakura grumbled.

"Then what?"

"…'Hikari'," he said, feeling that it sounded odd here, "I always called him that."

"Even when you were in the Ring?"

"Yes."

"That makes sense…you really didn't think of him as a human being back then," Malik mused, "I guess the name kind of makes sense, too. 'Light'."

"Sometimes, in his mind, he thought of me as the 'darkness'," Bakura said in a strained voice, "I guess that's how it came about."

To his surprise, Malik laughed.

"That makes it kind of sweet," the teen remarked.

"What?" Bakura asked suspiciously, almost physically recoiling from the word 'sweet'.

"If he's the light and you're the darkness…" Malik said, "Then doesn't calling him that sort of…attach him to you? The two go together. The darkness doesn't exist without the light."

Bakura was silent.

"I'm going back tonight," he said finally, "To that place. Angels' Lot."

"Are you sure that's wise?" Malik asked uneasily.

"…No," Bakura admitted, "But I'm going back. I need to. I don't know why."

Malik shrugged and half-smiled.

"Do what you need to do," he said, "But don't hurt Ryou, huh?"

"Stealing and hurting him seem to be the two things I'm good at in this world," Bakura muttered.

"It's easier than you think, being kind to him," Malik said, "He's the sort of person who makes you want to be nice to everyone…" he paused, "At least, he was."

"Was?" Bakura repeated immediately.

"Never mind," Malik said with a smile that was just a little too blithe.

"…You think he's gone," Bakura said slowly, "You think it's too late."

Malik's smile wavered slightly, but he didn't confirm or deny anything.

"Tell me more about Kul Elna," he said instead, settling himself more comfortably on the sofa.

"I already told you everything," Bakura said gruffly, feeling that familiar stab of pain that always came with the mention of that name. Seconds previously he had been silently marvelling at Malik's ability to charm the story out of him and then make him forget he'd even told it. Why did he have to bring it up again now?

"There's more to a town than its destruction," Malik said with a gentleness in his tone that Bakura wasn't familiar or comfortable with, "You must have had family, friends. There must have been a way of life there."

"Of course," Bakura snapped.

"So tell me," Malik implored.

"…Why?" Bakura asked, the first seeds of suspicion sprouting in his gut.

"Because I want to know."

"Why so interested?" he demanded, eyes narrowed, muscles tense and taut.

"I just am," Malik replied, looking somewhat perplexed by his sudden mistrust. Bakura surveyed him darkly. 'I just am' wasn't good enough. Malik always had a reason.

"It's some psychology shit, isn't it?" he said finally, spitting the word from his lips like something foul-tasting, "That's what all this is about."

"No," Malik said, appearing utterly astonished at this conclusion, "No, it's nothing like that."

"Is that why you wanted me to talk?" Bakura hissed, getting to his feet, "Want to see how my mind works? You think you can make me _sane_?"

"You're a bastard, Bakura," Malik said bluntly, not moving from his place on the sofa, "But you're perfectly sane."

"If you think that, why'd you bring me here?" the yami challenged fiercely, "Come on. Some kind of experiment, _Ishtar_?"

Malik said nothing. He just stared at him for a long moment, appearing incredulous and disappointed (_why?_), before looking away and directing his gaze back to the carpet. Bakura growled and snatched his knife up from the floor. It no longer seemed horrendous to him. It was just a knife again, and he stood torn between pocketing it and plunging it into Malik's chest.

He felt betrayed. He felt _stupid._

He'd just told his darkest secret. He'd spilled the horrors of his past to the Egyptian teen before him, and for what? Some college psychology investigation? Had he actually believed Malik gave a shit?

'I just am'…well, that said it all, didn't it?

Bakura snarled lowly to himself. He wanted to run out of here. But then where the hell would he go?

His dependence on Malik made him _sick_.

"I never told anyone about Mariku, y'know."

Bakura blinked.

"What?" he questioned, his rage momentarily quashed by this seemingly random statement. Malik pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms tightly around them, and Bakura was struck by how vulnerable and afraid he looked.

"When I was a kid…" Malik mumbled, "I never told anyone about Mariku. After the tomb-keeper's initiation, I could always feel him there, at the back of my mind. But I never said anything. I guess I was scared. It seemed easier to just pretend he wasn't real."

"What's your point?" Bakura snapped, not willing to be distracted.

"I think it made him stronger," Malik said quietly, "If I'd told Isis and Rishid…I don't know, maybe things would have been different. Instead he became a secret, buried inside of me. It was like a poison. It alienated me from everyone – secrets do that," he paused and swallowed hard, "I became so _obsessed _with denying his existence that he practically controlled me already."

"Is that so?" Bakura said, trying to sound sneering, but he was slowly beginning to understand.

"Maybe your secret controlled you, too," the blonde said with a small shrug, getting to his feet, "Maybe it ate you away inside without you noticing. I didn't start getting much better until way after Mariku went to the shadows. Not until I told Isis and Rishid everything. Not just the important parts. Everything," he paused and picked up his textbook, "And it wasn't 'some psychology shit'."

He turned away and walked unhurriedly towards his bedroom, which Bakura had never seen. It was like Malik's private world in there – the place he went to when he didn't want to talk anymore. A place where only he mattered, and he could stop worrying about everyone else's lives. He had unreservedly taken Bakura into his home, but they both knew, almost subconsciously, that that room was off-limits. Even when he was left in the apartment alone, it never occurred to Bakura to go in there.

"…Malik."

The blonde stopped and looked around expectantly at the Thief King's voice which, though still far from amused, had lost some of its angry heat. With Malik's lavender eyes on him questioningly, Bakura growled and glowered at the carpet.

"Maybe I was wrong," he conceded gruffly, "Maybe it's more than schoolwork for you. All this."

"Maybe it is," Malik said plaintively, but his expression was a little warmer before he shut the bedroom door behind him.

Bakura groaned and covered his face with one hand, closing his crimson eyes.

It made him sick to his stomach to admit it, but it had happened.

Over the past few days, he had been vaguely aware of the unfamiliar feeling pricking at the edge of his consciousness every time he saw Ryou and was reminded of how he had all but destroyed the sweetness and innocence in him.

But it had only been now, when he had thrown Malik's tentative attempts to help him back in his face and the boy had turned away, hurt and disappointed, that the waiting wave of _remorse _had fully swept over him, filling him with a new kind of pain, almost worse than any that he had endured before.

* * *

"…I still think we were kind of harsh on Malik earlier," Yuugi said unhappily as they finished closing up the game shop.

"Even though he's having an evil relapse?" Otogi muttered darkly, locking the front door.

"I agree, Yuugi," Sugoroku said loudly and jovially, earning surprised glances from the green-eyed youth and a still-fuming Atemu, "But it's alright. I'm sure we can _all _make amends tomorrow."

He cast meaningful glances up at the two boys. Otogi looked away awkwardly but Atemu appeared unfazed.

"I don't feel I can trust him. Not when he's keeping secrets like _that _from us," he said coolly, folding his arms.

"I'm sure he has his reasons…" Yuugi started to protest.

"I'm sure he does," Atemu said shortly, silencing him with a look.

"You boys listen," Sugoroku said more sternly than any of them (save Yuugi) thought him capable of, "We all know Malik's made some mistakes. No one's going to deny that, least of all him. But he grabbed his second chance with both hands. And he's worked hard in every way to prove it."

"Then why has he been talking with Bakura?" Atemu demanded, looking frustrated.

"I don't know. There could be a lot of reasons," the ageing man said patiently, "And what Malik said earlier was true. No good can come of you and Bakura crossing paths."

"Besides," Yuugi piped up, "Petty thievery aside, what damage can Bakura really do here? There are no Shadow Games, no Millennium Items…"

The Pharaoh looked unconvinced. His plum-coloured eyes were conflicted.

"I know my employees," Sugoroku said conclusively, "Malik's worked here almost three years now, without a sniff of trouble."

"Plus, we get way more girl customers now," Yuugi joked. No one laughed.

"…I don't like it," Atemu said, turning and exiting the shop through the staff door. Otogi followed. Sugoroku sighed and shook his head.

"The youth of today are so paranoid…" he said, putting his broom away.

"I'm not sure Atemu is a prime example of today's youth, grampa," Yuugi laughed.

* * *

_**End chapter.**_

_**Poor Malik. No good deed goes unpunished, indeed. And we really must wonder just what branch of psychology he's studying…**_

_**Woah…s**__**eriously, how many ups-and-downs were there in this chapter? It's like every time Malik resolves one argument with Bakura, the meanie Thief just finds another reason to get pissed off at him D: (And if it upsets me so much, why do I write it…?)**_

_**Thank you thank you thank you to pride1289, millenniumthief, CoCoBookmark, , Thief Mistress Thorn, chibi heishi, crispy von bunbun, AnimeLoverAngel, Sirithdiliel, felton0fanatic, Ceilo, Tifa Strifeheart, HanChan, Niilan, RyouLoverForever, gothboymylove, Franklyn, gliitch, XionItachi, anonymous, Schizo-of-Destiny, MidnightAffair, Vladimir the Hamster, Steamcry, Atomic Lightbulb, X-Panda-Chan-X, AirGirl Phantom and consumedbylove. You are all the chocolate sprinkles on my ice cream cone :]**_

_**Chapter 8's record remains unbroken, though! :P**_

_**Review?**_

_**Also please vote in my poll xD I'm advertising this thing everywhere.**_

_**Fiver**_


	11. Give You Hell

_**Chapter 11**__**: Give You Hell**_

Yuugi and the others probably would have thought it strange that, just as they were clocking off and looking forward to an evening's rest, someone else's working 'day' was just about to begin.

Ryou was less than thrilled with the prospect of his impending six pm to three am shift as he reluctantly changed out of his casual clothes and into more 'professional' attire. Black skinny jeans again – always popular. After a few moments of deliberation, he picked out a close-fitting, black, three-quarter-sleeved top to match.

Dressing all in black always felt a little weird. It didn't look natural, somehow.

He went into the bathroom and inspected his reflection in the slightly scratched mirror, feeling like some kind of sprucing girl as he did every evening. The top was a v-neck, and the neckline plunged a little too low for his liking, exposing a sizeable triangle of milky-pale skin that contrasted sharply with the dark-coloured material.

"_Nice 'uniform', by the way."_

He dropped his gaze and fiddled fretfully with a lock of his silvery hair as Bakura's disparaging words came back to him.

"Asshole…" he mumbled. It really grated on him that the spirit's cruel remarks could still cut him so deeply and make him feel so ashamed.

He narrowed his eyes slightly, straightened his stance and looked into the mirror again, defiantly.

One, that soul-stealer's opinion shouldn't matter a _damn_ to him.

Two, he had nothing to be ashamed of about his appearance. It was one of the few things about him that wasn't shameful. His alleged pretty face was just luck. He hadn't sold his looks – yet.

Besides. He was a boy. A low neckline wasn't exactly going to be a massive turn-on. And last night, all that he'd had exposed was his _stomach. _Stomachs were not erotic.

He groaned and left the bathroom, unable to believe he'd actually just had that thought.

He grabbed his grey canvas jacket and his mobile phone before leaving the apartment, locking the flaky green door behind him. He pocketed his keys and his phone. That was all he ever carried to work, if he could help it. Things went missing at the Lot, and rarely resurfaced again. So it was generally advised that employees only carried personal items that were absolutely necessary.

Ryou bit his lip and felt slightly sick as he slid his hand into his other pocket to check for the presence of the one other 'absolutely necessary' item that he always carried with him. Yes, it was there, cold and slick and so, so scary, as usual. He had been terrified that Malik or one of the others would notice it during his visit to the Game Shop. He didn't know what they would have thought of him.

Another tenant was passed out drunkenly out on the stairs, snoring loudly. Ryou stepped over him gingerly.

He walked as quickly as he could through the twilit streets without appearing hurried enough to attract attention. He didn't like winter. It got dark so early, and horrible things happened under cover of darkness in this place. And it was cold. He'd never held much affection for the cold. Even snow, which he'd always found dazzlingly beautiful, was much more pleasant when viewed through a window from the safety of a warm room.

He remembered Malik scolding him about his ineffective winter clothes earlier and cracked a rare smile, even though the memory nudged an unpleasant ache deep inside him. He was still somewhat peeved at the Egyptian for telling Bakura about Angels' Lot (and he still failed to see any logic behind the decision), but he missed Malik an awful lot. Maybe they seemed like unlikely friends, but Malik had taken such good care of him, back when…

He shook his head, unwilling to think back to that time.

Part of him knew, with unwavering certainty, that anytime he felt like it he could show up on Malik's doorstep, out of the blue, and the blonde would greet him with a smile, pull him inside and not let him leave again until they'd talked for about five hours straight, eaten whatever junk food they could find and drank whatever came to hand. He'd treat him like a real friend. Like family. Ryou could always rely on Malik to cheer him up and give him a tiny spark of hope to hold onto, no matter how dark and cold everything got…

But he just couldn't bring himself to go near that clean, tasteful apartment block in that clean, tasteful area. How could he? He didn't belong there anymore. And he had nothing to give in return. There was really nothing of worth left in him.

He was so deep in this festering pool of dark thoughts that it took him a lot longer than it should have to realise that something was wrong with him.

He wasn't breathing right. His throat felt strange. Hot. Clogged.

The streets of South Domino seemed to slow and fade around him for a moment. He managed to drag in one deep, proper breath and then proceeded to cough it back out, one hand clamped over his mouth as he did so. _Oh God…_

He didn't know how long he was coughing for, or how many people stopped briefly to stare – all he knew was that, by the time he'd finished, he was leaning heavily against a wall and his head and chest hurt. Really hurt. He tried to stand up straight and opened his eyes (which he didn't remember closing), only to find his vision swimming drunkenly. It made him feel dizzy and faintly nauseous, and he leaned back against the wall and shut his eyes tightly again, forcing himself to breathe deeply, calmly, in and out. _Don't be sick._ The bricks were cold, solid and reassuring against his back.

The feeling took a few minutes to pass, but when he opened his eyes again the world had gone back to dark and unpleasant normality.

He gave a small sigh of relief. That weird coughing always came on so suddenly, just like at the Game Shop, and those few times before…

It was perhaps not to Ryou's credit that now, like those times before, he forcefully brushed the incident off as something of negligible importance.

He suddenly heard a faint rustle of material and got the uneasy feeling that he was being watched. He turned around, ready to glare at any concerned bystander or (the entirely more likely) hopeful mugger. However, he could see no one. Puzzled, because his uneasy feelings were hardly ever unfounded, he looked all around him, trying to discern any hint of a person. The street was deserted.

The wall he had been leaning on was a good ten feet tall. Slowly, he looked up.

He stifled a gasp as he found himself confronted by an alarming figure, crouched atop the wall in a rather animal-like fashion. A pair of dark violet eyes stared down at him with a small amount of surprise and not all that much interest. For one ridiculous, bizarre moment, Ryou thought it was Malik – but of course not. After all, Malik's eyes didn't look like that at all. Not really.

"Mariku?" he said without thinking.

It was. Ryou had never laid eyes on him before, but he knew it could be no one else. The darkest darkness was peering down at him, all platinum-blonde spikes and billowing purple cloak and deep lavender eyes – darker than Malik's. So much darker.

Those eyes narrowed a fraction and Ryou swallowed, tensing slightly. He knew more about Malik's deep-rooted fear of his yami than almost anyone else, and it did occur to him that maybe he should run. But while those slanted eyes didn't hold any concern for the boy they had watched struggling for breath moments previously, they didn't hold any malice either.

"…You know me," the dusky-skinned yami said at length. Ryou discreetly moved back a few paces, but held his gaze.

"I know Malik," he said by way of explanation. Mariku snorted.

"I know that," he affirmed before leaning forward (somewhat precariously to Ryou's eyes) and peering at him more closely, "And you. I know you. You're the Thief's light."

"No," Ryou replied with a frown, "I'm Ryou."

Mariku tilted his head to one side.

"I see," he said at length.

"…Malik isn't around here," Ryou said after a pause. Mariku gave a small, humourless smile.

"I know that, too," he informed him.

"Then why are you here?" Ryou asked, perplexed. The suddenness of this encounter still had him baffled.

"Hm. I wanted to see what was so _interesting_," Mariku said vaguely, "I don't think I see it, though. You seem quite boring."

Ryou didn't know whether to feel insulted or merely confused.

"Don't be upset," the yami said, lying back on the wall's narrow summit and lounging there lazily, as if he were on a sun-bed and not a ten-foot high wall on a cold winter's night, "Everyone seems quite boring, compared to him."

"You mean Malik?" Ryou questioned, a bubble of anxiety forming in his stomach, "Have you seen him?"

Mariku looked slightly furtive.

"He hasn't seen me," he replied, "If that's what you mean."

"…You've been watching him?" Ryou said in realisation.

"Sometimes. From the shadows," the yami said, vague again.

"But…why?" Ryou couldn't help asking, thinking of the sheer horror Malik would feel if he had the slightest idea that those dark eyes were following his daily movements.

"I tried not to," Mariku said, looking off to the side as if in shame or guilt, "But I had to see him. Couldn't help it. This world doesn't seem all that real when I don't see him…" he trailed off and shifted his gaze upwards, towards the sky which, Ryou noticed for the first time, was starry and cloudless, "…He's changed, hasn't he?"

"Since you left? Yes. A lot," Ryou said, more bluntly than he may have intended. However, Mariku didn't seem to take offence, or even take notice.

"He seems so…calm," he said thoughtfully, "Not today, though…you changed all that."

"Today? You were watching the Game Shop?" Ryou questioned in amazement, "That's how you knew I know him…?"

"He _was_ calm. But you brought all these _highs and lows_. I didn't know people could feel so many different things in one day…" Mariku remarked with some bewilderment, shaking his head, "I thought you must have been something pretty special, to make him go through all that."

"How closely were you watching?" Ryou asked, mildly appalled. Mariku chuckled quietly.

"I don't have to see omote to know what he's feeling," he said matter-of-factly. Ryou raised an eyebrow but said nothing. He supposed 'omote' was Malik's equivalent of his 'hikari', and for that reason he didn't like hearing it.

"So then I followed you. To see what was so interesting, like I said," the yami went on, scrutinising him as if still trying to see it, "I don't. But you notice more than other people, anyway. No one else in this world has even looked at me. Just you."

Ryou was pretty sure it was more paranoia than perceptiveness, but he didn't argue.

"Will you talk to Malik?" he asked instead. Mariku stared blankly at him for a long time.

"Do you think I should?" he questioned finally, sounding slightly intrigued, "Would it be a 'great surprise'?"

"Well, no," Ryou admitted with a shrug, "I don't think he'd like it."

"So I won't," Mariku said simply, looking back up at the clear sky, "Or I'll try not to."

"…Really?" Ryou said suspiciously, "Just like that?"

"It's better if I don't," the blonde yami said, as if this should have been perfectly obvious, "If it would only trouble him."

Ryou laughed softly and coldly.

"I guess that makes you the better darkness," he murmured venomously. Mariku blinked slowly, looking back at him.

"The Thief stays by you?" he questioned, "When you want him gone?"

"That seems to be his general endeavour," Ryou said with no shortage of bitterness.

"Hah," Mariku said, mouth forming a crooked smile, "He must have even more to make up for than I do."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ryou asked dubiously, just as his phone started buzzing in his pocket. He looked away for a brief second to retrieve it, and when he looked back the yami was gone. He pulled a face.

"I guess I was boring him…" he muttered irritably, holding the phone to his ear, "Hello?"

"_Ryou! Man, you're alive!" _Ryou winced away from the earpiece as Kazuma's 'dulcet' tones blared through, _"Where the hell are you?"_

"Relax, I'm on my way," the white-haired teen retorted, glancing at his watch and cursing silently as he realised his coughing fit and chat with Malik's darkness meant he was now at least ten minutes late for work.

"_Don't get snappy, man, I was worried sick!" _Kazuma yelled, _"You're never late, so I thought…"_

"That I was stupid enough to get myself kidnapped?" Ryou finished for him, starting to walk in the direction of Angels' Lot, "No. I just…I ran into someone."

"_Someone?" _Kazuma repeated suspiciously, _"Who?"_

"Just someone," Ryou said stubbornly, "Someone from a long time ago. Not a mugger, rapist or murderer, if that's what you're worried about."

_Just the psychopathic embodiment of my friend's anger and hate_, he added silently to himself, only now realising the danger he could have been in. But Mariku hadn't seemed the way Malik had always described him, in the brief moments when he could conquer his fear long enough to talk about him…

"_Whatever, man. As long as you're ok. But you won't be, if you don't get your ass down here soon. It's only a matter of time before Uchimura notices Sato turning every other waiter away."_

"He's there _again_?" Ryou said, dread rising in his stomach.

"_Yeah. Sorry. Guess he didn't get enough last night."_

"If he thinks he's getting anything tonight, he's in for a shock…" Ryou muttered through gritted teeth, "Ok. I'll be there in a few minutes."

Unfortunately, what Ryou didn't know was that Takeshi Sato was not the only one of his current nemeses waiting for him at Angels' Lot.

* * *

Bakura watched with mild boredom as Kazuma finished his rather over-dramatic phone-call.

"He's fine," the taller man informed him, snapping his mobile phone shut, "Snarky as hell. That means he's fine."

"Fantastic," Bakura said dully with a slight sneer. Kazuma's evident distress at Ryou's tardiness had been pissing him off for the last ten minutes. At his lack of rejoicing the other man shook his head.

"Man," he said in disbelief, "You're colder than he is. Makes me wonder why ya bothered coming here in the first place."

"Hn," Bakura said dismissively, not wanting to get into _that _discussion again, "Why's he late, anyway?"

"Said he ran into someone," Kazuma said with a shrug, "Any idea who that'd be?"

"Saying he ran into 'someone' doesn't give me many clues," Bakura replied, raising an eyebrow.

"Tell me about it. 'Someone from a long time ago', I think he said. Sounds like a horoscope, huh?"

Bakura's forehead twitched into a frown at that. That narrowed it down considerably. One of Mutou's idiotic friends, maybe? The Pharaoh himself?

He growled and shook his head roughly.

Just then, the kitchen door swung open, accompanied by a blast of freezing air. Ryou stood silhouetted in the doorway, appearing slightly out of breath. As Bakura had somewhat expected, his brown eyes flashed icily when they found him invading his workplace for the second night running.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded, slamming the door shut behind him, "_Again._"

Bakura merely raised his eyebrows in a mocking manner and folded his arms, as if silently scolding his light for his poor manners.

"Get out," Ryou ordered, pointing to the door furiously, "Just _go._"

Kazuya started to look distinctly ill at ease. Laughing internally, Bakura turned to him with a smirk.

"Do you want to tell him, or should I?" he asked tauntingly. Kazuma scowled.

"Shut up, man," he muttered.

"Tell me what?" Ryou questioned suspiciously, turning his stormy gaze to Kazuma, who appeared tempted to cower before him and his very evident fury. The temptation was overcome, however, and he instead grabbed the teen by the collar, dragged him over to the nearest kitchen counter, picked him up as if he were a doll and sat him on it. Ryou looked down at him with pursed lips and an expectant look in his narrowed eyes. Not meeting his gaze, Kazuma muttered some lengthy explanation that Bakura couldn't quite hear. It was clear that Ryou caught on pretty quickly, though, because the more the tall man told him, the more dangerous his expression became.

"So…" the teen said at length, speaking slowly and so, so coldly, "You want _him_…" he paused to cast a scathing look in Bakura's direction, "To protect _me._"

"…Yeah," Kazuma mumbled, looking more cowed by this skinny teenager than seemed quite possible, "I mean, I can't always be there for you…and last night, he…"

He trailed off when Ryou started to laugh – a quiet laugh that got steadily louder, darker and more spiteful. Kazuma stared at him, clearly disturbed by the unnerving sound. Even Bakura tensed up slightly, unsettled, as his hikari tilted his head back and just laughed at the ceiling.

"_He's _going to take care of me," the teen said finally. He kept his neck craned backwards, his small nose pointing heavenwards, but his eyes found Bakura, and it seemed to him that those eyes were still laughing in that icy, humourless way, "_Him. _Wow, Great Stealer of Souls. Isn't the irony just a little…bit…_sickening?_"

"Just a little," Bakura returned evenly, concealing his inner disquiet. Ryou's eyes laughed at him screamingly a moment longer, and then the teen gave one last giggle and slid off the counter. Kazuma stepped back to give him room, and maybe to put a little distance between them, too. Ryou didn't seem to notice. He pulled his jacket off and disappeared into an adjoining cloakroom to hang it up. When he reappeared, he made as if to walk straight past them without any further discussion.

"Ryou, man, wait," Kazuma said with a hint of desperation, grabbing his wrist, "I'm sorry, ok? I was just messin' around, I didn't know things were this…weird. Serious. Don't even worry about it, I'll get rid of him if ya like-!"

"No," Ryou said shortly, turning slightly to flash Bakura another frosty smile, "No. Let's keep him. Let's see how long he can take it. Let's see who hates best."

With that, he tugged out of Kazuma's grip and exited the room through the door leading to the main body of the club. He left the kitchen in a stunned silence.

"Damnit…" Kazuma muttered finally, whirling around to stare at Bakura, "What the hell is this? That was about a billion times creepier than last night! What is it about you that makes him snap? Hell, what did you _do _to him?"

"…Trust me," Bakura said with a grim smirk, "You wouldn't understand."

Kazuma growled.

"Did you hurt him?" he snarled dangerously, "I could understand _that_ much."

"Hurt him?" Bakura repeated with exaggerated thoughtfulness, "Hm. I suppose I did. I hurt him over and over, and hardly knew I was doing it. It didn't seem important at all, at the time."

Kazuma stared hard at him, tight-lipped.

"And now?" he demanded, "Does it seem important now? Seems to me like you fucked him up pretty bad. Do you give a shit _at all?_"

Bakura paused and looked fixedly at the door his hikari had so recently left through before giving the honest answer.

"I don't know."

* * *

Ryou fought down the urge to curl his lip as he saw a sleazy grin spread over Takeshi's face when the man caught sight of him approaching the table.

It was too bad Takeshi hadn't witnessed that little scene in the kitchen. If he had, he might have known to take a few steps back tonight. He might have realised that Ryou was already riled up beyond normal reason, and that tormenting him in the course of the evening was statistically a lot more likely to get him strangled than on other nights.

But, of course, Takeshi had no idea about any of that.

"Well look who came out of hiding," he said lazily, leaning back with satisfaction as Ryou handed out the usual drinks, "Where've you been, Ryou?"

"I ran a little late, Mr Sato," he replied, hoping the idiot wouldn't notice his gritted teeth.

"Tut, tut." Takeshi said, shaking his head, "Keeping your admirers waiting? How disgraceful."

Ryou pressed his lips together and didn't say another word.

"…Hey," the peroxide-blonde man said suddenly with a frown, "Is that guy from last night here?"

"Which guy?" Ryou questioned, even though he could guess exactly who he meant.

"The one who broke up our little party," Takeshi said with a slight sneer.

"Oh, him," Ryou said absently, "I think he's here somewhere."

"Better keep his fucking distance…" Takeshi muttered, "Who is he?"

"New bouncer, I think," Ryou said with a shrug, as if it really didn't matter a damn to him.

"New, huh? Someone better show him the ropes around here real soon, or he's gonna wind up dead," Sato said ominously before grinning again, "Did you get the present I left for you?"

"Of course," Ryou replied softly, making his most humble and demure face, "You really shouldn't make such extravagant gestures, Mr Sato. People might get…the wrong idea."

Takeshi crowed with laughter.

"You're so cute," he chuckled, grabbing his chin and pulling him down until their faces were level, "You worried people might think we're _involved?_"

"Not at all," Ryou said with his sweetest smile, "I'm worried they might think you're a generous man."

He said it so innocently, so lightly, that it took Takeshi a few moments to notice the thorn amongst the flowery speech. He blinked in surprise, and then smirked darkly and tightened his hold on Ryou's face until it was painful.

"What a cold little bitch," he whispered.

"That's me," Ryou replied unsmilingly. He didn't care tonight. He couldn't hold his tongue or fake a smile tonight. He felt like there was some kind of vicious storm raging inside of him, and it seemed ridiculous that his day-to-day life wanted to go on as normal while he tried to deal with it. So just for tonight, he was going to let the mask crack.

"You're lucky you're so pretty," Takeshi informed him sinisterly, "People don't usually say shit like that about me."

"Maybe not to your face…" Ryou murmured, looking away. To his surprise – and displeasure – Takeshi just chuckled lowly.

"You've got a sharp tongue on you tonight, Ryou," he said, "I like it. Maybe one day I'll feel just how sharp it really is, huh? I bet it feels _real good._"

Ryou's face went white with disgust. He jerked out of Sato's grasp, not caring one bit if Uchimura saw, and spun on his heel and walked away. As usual, he could hear Takeshi laughing raucously behind him.

He reached the bar and stopped, struggling to regain his composure. He fought to keep his breathing even, keep his mind stable. At times like this, when just one too many things started bombarding him, he wasn't entirely sure of his own sanity. He didn't know how many times he'd caught himself on the brink of smashing a glass into Sato's face, shoving his boss down a flight of stairs, digging his nails into some amorous customer's wandering eyes…

Oh God, it just wasn't normal…

"Um…excuse me…?"

"_What?_" Ryou snapped, whirling around. His expression immediately softened when the unfamiliar young man behind him shrunk back in apparent fright, adjusting a pair of small squarish glasses sheepishly. Ryou cringed inwardly and took a deep breath.

"Sorry," he said in a much calmer voice, bowing his head slightly, "Sorry, that was really rude…"

"That's alright," the man said with a slightly nervous smile, "Sorry to bother you, you must be stressed from working…"

"No, that's alright…" Ryou said uncertainly, slightly thrown off by his politeness, "I just…never mind. Did you need something?"

"I was just looking to order some drinks," he said apologetically, "It's not urgent, if you're busy…"

"No, not at all," Ryou said quickly as he hopped behind the bar, only hoping that Uchimura hadn't seen him yell in this guy's face, "What would you like…?"

He took the guy's order – extreme lightweight stuff by this place's standards – and took it over to his table despite the young man's stuttering insistence that he could do it. Ryou reminded him that this was his job and he fell silent.

Ryou was surprised to find that the man wasn't here with a friend or colleague as he had automatically expected. Instead, he sat at a table with a much older-looking man with grey hair and a very severe expression that the teen found oddly intimidating. He didn't question it – what was it to him, anyway? – but the young man (who really seemed more like a mere boy to Ryou, but who was _he_ to judge anyone?) seemed to feel the need to explain anyway.

"This is my uncle," he said with a bashful smile that was somewhat endearing, "He's trying to…um…you know. 'Show me the ropes' with places like this."

"I'll make a man of him yet," the older man grunted, raising his steely-grey eyes briefly in acknowledgement of Ryou and his drink.

"Places like this?" Ryou repeated vaguely as he set the glasses down on the table.

"Uh…yeah. I've never really been to a club before," the younger man confessed, looking unsure whether to be embarrassed or proud of the fact.

"Couldn't you have done better than this place for your maiden outing?" Ryou questioned with raised eyebrows, momentarily forgetting his position.

"As an employee, I don't think you're meant to talk like that," the older man said in a voice that betrayed very little amusement, "This is the perfect place, actually. Start right at the bottom and you appreciate the top a lot more."

"No offence meant, of course," the younger man interjected hastily.

"Of course," Ryou said dryly, "Enjoy your drinks."

He turned to leave, but halted at the sound of the older man's voice.

"Hang on there, kid," he said, sounding as though he was rather enjoying his the-customer-is-always-right status, "First you talk insultingly about your own workplace, and then you just turn your back on your customers? You're lowering my opinion of this place further and further by the second."

"I'm sorry," Ryou said, turning back to them, "Was there something else you wanted?"

"I know how these places work," the older man informed him brusquely, "You're paid to entertain as well as serve, right?"

"That depends what kind of 'entertainment' you're thinking of," Ryou said quietly, averting his eyes awkwardly. The man brought out a feeling of anxious shyness in him that he hadn't experienced since leaving high school. It wasn't a feeling he was eager to reacquaint himself with.

To his slight surprise, both men laughed quietly at his words, and the younger of the two looked more than a little embarrassed by the very idea of what Ryou had suspected they wanted.

"Get yourself a drink, kid," the older man chuckled, "Then sit yourself down here. And entertain."

Ryou hesitated, but only for a moment. He hadn't the slightest idea what the man was talking about – his obvious disdain for everyone here made it seem unlikely that he genuinely wanted his company for the evening – but he didn't want to be laughed at again (after all, that sort of thing pissed him off just enough for him to think about doing something crazy again). So he merely nodded and made his way quickly to the bar, where he poured himself a glass of Coke. Another young waiter brushed past him and smirked sardonically, his eyes practically screaming the word '_light-weight_'. But that wasn't what made Ryou pause and then reach for the nearest bottle of vodka. No, it was that man. The older one. He made him nervous, and Ryou didn't like to be nervous…

He was careful not to make the drink too strong. Last time he'd done that, the taste alone had almost made him gag, and three glasses of the stuff had been enough to make him regret it the next day. He knew better now. Just enough to take the nervous edge away.

He glanced over at the table. Besides, he might need it. This could be a long night.

He picked up his glass and returned to the table, mentally steeling himself for whatever was to come. He wasn't particularly surprised when the older man failed to acknowledge his presence, though it did make him wonder why he'd ordered him to come back here. But he quickly found that the answer to that question was sitting directly to his right. The young man still looked somewhat ill at ease with his surroundings, but he smiled awkwardly at Ryou and stuck out a hand.

"I'm Hideki," he informed him as Ryou dubiously accepted the handshake – a polite gesture he hadn't needed to partake in for quite some time.

"Ryou…" he replied uncertainly, taking a sip of his drink as he got the feeling he might be needing its effects sooner rather than later. Because this was just plain strange. This wasn't what he was _used to _at work.

"It's nice to meet you," Hideki said earnestly, pushing his glasses up his nose in what was obviously a nervous habit.

"Christ, boy," the older man interjected with a growl, "He's a club worker, not a dinner date."

"What- what has _that _got to do with anything?" Hideki returned, looking absolutely mortified at his uncle's blatant lack of respect. Ryou, who was well used to such treatment by now, sat back and watched them with slight amusement as they debated how he should be spoken to. This guy…

Certainly, he was awkward and a little socially inept and clearly had absolutely _no clue _about the status and supposed role of workers within a club, but…

Ryou's eyes softened ever so slightly. In a place like this, none of those traits were bad things.

* * *

"_What do you mean I have to walk him home?"_

Kazuma gave a world-weary sigh and folded his arms. It irked Bakura to no end that the brown-haired man would cower in barely-disguised terror before Ryou, and yet never seemed even remotely threatened by him.

"Sorry, man, didn't I mention that in your job description?" the taller man said in an almost-drawl, "Like I said before, I'm not letting Ryou wander around this death-trap of a city alone at night."

"So drive him home yourself, like you _did _before," Bakura snapped.

"Shut up, man," Kazuma said absently, barely paying attention to him and his rage, "You're taking responsibility now. That's what you're here for."

Bakura seethed silently, unable to think of any further argument apart from the fact that he didn't _want _to walk through these dark twisted streets alone with Ryou, because one of them might kill the other and he wasn't exactly sure whose favour the odds were in, and because he'd spent long enough tonight not-quite in the presence of his hikari and that had been bad enough – just watching him at a distance had got him to thinking about how strange and cold he'd become and how everything was just so _wrong, _and he couldn't pinpoint how or why because there were so many ways that it was all just wrong, and...

All in all, spending any sort of time alone with Ryou at the moment was not going to be conducive for his mental (and possibly physical, depending on the teen's mood) health.

He was still simmering quietly to himself when his light came back into the kitchen a few minutes later.

"Ryou-!" Kazuma said quickly, as if concerned the teen would rush off again if he wasn't fast enough, "Shift's over, man."

"I can keep going," Ryou replied quietly. Bakura blinked despite himself. The teen didn't look anywhere near happy (it seemed he never did these days), but he seemed calm. The laughter and hysterics of earlier had apparently been temporary. He supposed Ryou just bottled everything up, absorbing all the anger and unfairness and hurt like a sponge, and then every so often it just exploded out in one crazy burst. Boom. Then he remembered that was why Kazuma had wanted him to come back here – to induce those little outbursts on a more frequent basis. He couldn't help but smirk. The guy almost definitely regretted it now.

"Your shift's _over_," Kazuma repeated in a tone of voice that gave away the fact that he was exerting some authority he possessed, pushing Ryou's pay for the night into his reluctant hands, "Go home. You look tired."

He did. Bakura felt idiotic for not observing it before. His only excuse was that the tiredness had become such a dominant, ingrained aspect of Ryou's appearance that it almost seemed commonplace. Scarily, it was getting harder and harder to picture him looking any different. If it ever occurred to Bakura to think about the Ryou from before – the Ryou he'd known inside out without really knowing him at all – it was a conscious effort to recall that face, that smile, those scared but gentle eyes.

Maybe because that boy from back then was fading away for real...?

Bakura felt slightly queasy without really knowing why.

"Your new bodyguard'll walk you back," Kazuma added just a little bit too off-handily, clearly fearing another horror movie moment.

"Him?" Ryou questioned, glancing at Bakura as if only just remembering about his existence (but he was still calm - the cold fire had burned out for now, the quiet ice was in control), "I'd rather go by myself."

"I don't care," Kazuma shot back at him sternly, to Bakura's surprise, "I'll back down from you about other things, Ryou, but not this. You're not going alone. Ever. Get used to it."

Ryou looked at him sourly but didn't debate the matter further, instead merely stomping off to the cloakroom to get his jacket.

"...Whoo," Kazuma whistled once he was out of earshot, severe facade falling away, "Took my life in my hands there, I think."

"Very brave," Bakura remarked dully.

"Yeah..." Kazuma said, ignoring or not noticing Bakura's blatant sarcasm, "Oh yeah, here's your first pay too. Are you excited?"

"Hardly," Bakura replied dryly, sneering disdainfully at the pitiful pile of notes being presented to him but pocketing them anyway.

"So difficult to please..." Kazuma sighed with mock-sadness before fixing him with a sudden glare that could have struck a weaker soul dead on the spot, "Listen up. This applies to tonight and every night you're here. Ryou's probably not going to make it easy for you to keep your eye on him on the way home. Hell, he makes it difficult for me sometimes, and no way does he hate me as much as you..."

"Why the crazy determination to go alone?" Bakura questioned, raising an eyebrow. He was aware that much of Ryou's behaviour these days was unfathomable to him, but this in particular seemed bizarrely out-of-character, not to mention completely illogical.

"Pft, you tell me why that kid does anything," Kazuma said, rolling his eyes, "I treat him like a baby brother or something, but that doesn't mean I have any idea what goes on in that wacky white head. Anyway. Ryou can be a crafty little punk sometimes. Even I've lost sight of him a few times. But, y'know, you're getting _paid _to do this. So I don't care _how _crafty he decides to be – you _will _make sure he gets home safe."

"Save your breath," Bakura snarled, "There's nothing _you _can threaten me with that would make any difference."

Kazuma looked at him darkly. It occurred to Bakura for the first time that one of the reasons the man looked so affronted when he talked down to him might be that Bakura actually looked physically _younger _than him. Oh, if only his mortal mind could comprehend the truth.

Ryou chose that moment to reappear, apparently ready to go. He glanced at the two of them and looked as though he was thinking about saying something, but in the end he simply turned away and walked out the door. Bakura stared after him for a moment, mildly baffled. Kazuma snorted audibly.

"Get to work, man," he said, clapping Bakura's shoulder briefly, "Enjoy the chase."

One way or another, Bakura did manage to get Ryou home in one piece that night, despite being tempted to rend him limb from limb himself more than once. He wasn't entirely sure _how _he managed it, but he felt like he'd really achieved something until he remember he'd have to do it almost every night from now on.

"Twelve o'clock tomorrow," Ryou informed him flatly as he entered his apartment building, not even turning to look at him, "Unless you've had enough."

"...Twelve midnight?" Bakura questioned, perplexed. Ryou threw a short, harsh laugh back at him, and he supposed that meant he'd guessed wrong. Twelve noon, then. Weird, but whatever.

Shaking his head, Bakura turned to head back towards the safer side of Domino City, unable to quite pinpoint any precise reason why he was doing this to himself.

Or Ryou.

* * *

_**God. This chapter was seriously a bitch to write. Well, the **__**first few scenes were fine. Then it just felt like it was just going on and on and on...I was going to put a lot more detail into Ryou and Bakura's little jaunt home, but I felt the chapter really needed to end ._. Don't worry. You'll see waaay too many of those scenes soon enough. **_

_**By the way, **__**I apologise for the abnormally high number of OCs popping up in this story. These are the last, I swear. And don't worry. No OC will ever get their own scene or subplot or anything which doesn't involve a canon character -.-**_

_**At least Mariku finally appeared. When I started planning this story out at first, he was actually scheduled to show up in chapter 3. Then he got shunted to chapter 5. And that somehow became chapter 11. My bad?**_

_**When I posted chapter 10, I hoped that I'd get enough reviews to push the total past the 200 mark. As it happened, you guys totally smashed the 200 mark to smithereens. Thank you all so much :) One thing I noticed, though...Even after 10 (or now, 11) chapters, everyone's defining moment of the whole story still seems to be Ryou cracking Bakura with the bat back in chapter 1 xD Will I never be able to beat that single moment of awesome? Seriously, I feel like the bat should have a name and back-story all to itself xD**_

**_Chocolate-smothered thank yous go out to Thief Mistress Thorn, pride1289, ONIX-21, Vladimir the Hamster, chibi heishi, Atomic Lightbulb, AirGirl Phantom, Franklyn, , Twilight-Imp-626, StalkPatrol, Chimera, AnimeLoverAngel, 0Capella0, YaoifanRisaMM, Sirithdiliel, felton0fanatic, Kiri-chan220, Ceilo, Paradocs, XionItachi, Crimson315, Lavender New Age, ScarlettKuasta, Schizo-of-Destiny, KyoxSakiFan, Niilan, ACE329, Airyballoon, subaru1999, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, gliitch, animeluver29, Tenshi no Toki and FoxyHottie. You are all the ingredients for my favourite cake :]_**

**_Also. Last chance to vote in the next-story poll. It's closing tomorrow :]_**

**_Review?_**

**_Fiver x_**


	12. The Thin Ice

_**Chapter 12: The Thin Ice**_

"So…" Atemu said stiffly on Saturday morning as he and Yuugi set about getting the Kame Game Shop ready for a day's business, "Will Malik be in today?"

"Yes, he will," Yuugi informed him as he mopped the floor around the entrance, "Nine 'til two. Don't fight with him. Please."

"I don't _want _to fight with him, aibou," the Pharaoh said with frustration, "But if he continues to be so…so _incorrigible, _then-"

"Then what?" Yuugi questioned unhappily, looking at him with imploring amethyst eyes that had lost none of their childish charm over the past three years, "Why do you need to know where Bakura is so badly, anyway?"

Atemu was somewhat ashamed by how long it took him to think of an answer to that.

"I may need to speak with him," he said finally.

"Are you sure you aren't just going to start another fight?" Yuugi said glumly.

"No!" Atemu said immediately, "But it seems he is still causing problems for Ryou, and if I want to help him, then…"

"Atemu," Yuugi said abruptly, turning around a little too quickly and spraying the front door with mop-water, "You need to give up on Ryou, ok? You can't help him. Not unless you can find someone even more stubborn than he is. And believe me…" he sighed, "It turns out Ryou is _really _stubborn."

"You don't care for him much, do you?" Atemu questioned, perhaps more accusingly than he intended.

"Of course I care about him!" Yuugi cried, looking upset, "He didn't deserve all the horrible things that happened to him. But right now I care about Malik more, because I've actually _seen _Malik more than five times over the past two years!"

Atemu started to respond before frowning.

"…Two years?" he repeated.

"Yeah," Yuugi affirmed, looking away uncomfortably, "Ok, I saw a lot of Ryou the first year after you left, because that's when he was really ill…"

"You never told me about that," Atemu said, stricken.

"It was a long time ago," Yuugi said fixedly, "He got better. Then he practically severed contact with us. Malik stuck around."

"Ryou never hurt you the way Malik did…" Atemu muttered, unwilling to show how surprised he was by Yuugi's words. He hadn't expected his light to back up their former enemy so whole-heartedly, and to almost disregard a boy who had once been his friend. But perhaps he had been foolish to expect that Yuugi's relationships with those around him would have remained exactly the same over all this time.

"Malik went through some bad stuff, too," Yuugi said morosely, "All things considered, it's surprising he was the only tomb-keeper who harboured such terrible hate…"

"Do you think it's my fault?" Atemu asked, somewhat affronted.

"No, of course not." Yuugi groaned, "I don't think we can point a finger at any one person and say it was their fault. It just…shouldn't have happened. It was so tragic. At the time, none of us cared, because Malik was our enemy. We didn't flinch when Isis told us his story. We didn't even think of the person we were fighting as her little brother. Y'know, just another kid, just like us. A kid who'd been broken up so badly…" he trailed off for a moment, leaning on the mop, "He has the secret of your past _carved into his back_, Atemu. He'll carry that mark for the rest of his life. We didn't think about that either, did we? Even when he showed it to us…we never thought...He was only ten. He must have thought he would die with that pain. We never thought about how unfair it was."

Atemu did feel a stab of guilt then. He'd forgotten that the hate and rage that had exploded out of Malik during Battle City had been just like the same dark emotions now surrounding Ryou – there had been a reason for them.

"I'm sorry, aibou," he said sincerely, "It's not that I don't _pity _Malik – I do. But this matter with the tomb-robber…you're right, I don't really need to see him right now. But it's the principle of the thing. That Malik refuses to tell us where he is, I mean. It's like he's…protecting Bakura."

"You think they're planning something together, don't you?" Yuugi asked quietly.

"…Yes," Atemu admitted reluctantly, "I can't see any other reason for this secrecy."

"Like grampa said, there could be a lot of reasons," Yuugi insisted, "Malik's smart."

"Malik's cunning," Atemu corrected grimly.

Yuugi frowned and looked fully set to argue this point, when the door opened and the subject of their debate stepped into the shop.

To anyone looking – even Yuugi, who knew him well – Malik looked calm, unruffled and totally unfazed at being unexpectedly in the presence of the two doppelgangers. Anyone – especially Atemu, who immediately took his cool exterior for callousness – would have thought he had completely forgotten the events of the previous day. Only his sister, or perhaps Rishid, would have observed the subtle tightness in his jaw, the slightly guarded look in his eyes, and known that he was less than at ease.

"…Morning," he said quietly after a moment of suffocating silence.

"…Hi," Yuugi said with artificial brightness and an awkward smile when Atemu merely looked stonily at the new arrival, "Um…how are things?"

"…Fine, thanks," Malik replied, clearly cringing inside at the potential lameness of this conversation, "With you two?"

"Great," Yuugi said, smile widening. Atemu still didn't say anything, "Did you do anything last night?"

Malik's mouth twitched into a small, dry smirk.

"Is this an interrogation?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. Yuugi flushed bright red.

"No, I was…just asking…" he mumbled. Malik laughed lightly.

"Yeah, I know. Sorry," he said, going past them and heading for the back-shop, "No, I didn't do anything. Just stayed in."

"Alone?" Atemu spoke up abruptly. Malik halted and turned his head slowly to look at him. Bemused lilac met steely plum orbs.

"Just asking, Pharaoh?" Malik questioned.

"No, it's an interrogation," Atemu said bluntly, "Tomb-keeper."

Malik visibly flinched at the old title.

"Don't demote me to your servant again just because you're back here," he said with a heady laugh and a spark of anger in his typically calm eyes, "Alright. No, I wasn't alone. I invited the whole college cheerleading squad back to my apartment, and we had a _fantastic _night of it. Until we ran out of liquor and condoms."

Yuugi, well accustomed to the blonde's scathing humour, almost choked on his own suppressed laughter, but Atemu's mouth dropped open in revulsion.

"That was a joke," Malik explained patiently. The Pharaoh glared at him.

"This is no joking matter, Malik," he said acidly (not feeling quite brash enough to call him 'tomb-keeper' again), "I don't know what you're up to, but hiding a criminal is a crime in itself, you know. Nowadays I believe you call it aiding and abetting…"

Malik's mouth shrunk to a tight, thin line and his lavender eyes flashed furiously. Yuugi, who had seen the Egyptian teen properly lose his temper less than half a dozen times since Battle City, edged backwards slightly.

"Really?" Malik said frostily, all attempts at humour clearly being abandoned, "And what about Kul Elna? What would you call that?"

Some of the colour drained from Atemu's face.

"How do you know about-?" he started to ask before he saw the obvious answer and his look darkened, "The tomb-robber told you."

"I asked him why he's so full of hate, and he told me," Malik informed him coldly, "You look shocked, Pharaoh. I guess you didn't expect me to ever know."

"We saw no use in telling anyone that story," Atemu said, "It wasn't hidden only from you."

"But you never wanted me to find out, did you?" Malik challenged, "You knew I wouldn't just unconditionally accept your judgement. You knew that I would be the only one to tell you that it was all so twisted – that you fought on the _wrong side._"

"I knew that you would side with anyone if it meant standing against me," Atemu shot back at him.

Yuugi saw the shock and hurt pass across Malik's face. Atemu didn't.

"…I couldn't believe him at first," the blonde said finally, "I couldn't believe that you would fight him so blindly, knowing that your family had destroyed his whole world. But I see now. You pretend like that atrocity never happened. Bakura went against you. He hurt you. And it's easier for you to hate him if he's just 'bad'," he paused. His face held a mixture of pity and contempt, "You had to fight him, because he was bad and you were good. That logic had to stand."

Atemu was pale and tight-lipped, infuriated by this hatefully intelligent boy who shot unbearable truths at him like poison darts.

"I did what I had to do. To save _everyone_," he informed the Egyptian teen as calmly as he could, "I don't know what warped version of the story you heard, Malik, but-"

"I'm sure everyone has their own 'version'," Malik said, folding his arms, "There's only one thing that's important. I want to hear it from you. Did ninety-nine people – a whole village – die at the whim of one powerful man?"

"…It wasn't like that," Atemu muttered, looking away, "They were evil…it was necessary…"

"Were they killed?" Malik asked impatiently.

"Yes!" Atemu shouted angrily, "Yes, a village of vagrant evil-doers was wiped out – for the good of all!"

Malik looked at him for a long, agonising moment.

"Then it was a crime," he said at length.

"You don't understand-" Atemu started crossly.

"It was a crime, Pharaoh!" Malik said fiercely, "And do you know what we call _that _nowadays? We call that _genocide!_"

Atemu decided very fixedly in that moment that he would never like Malik. Such a headstrong, impetuous _child. _A boy who had never learned his place. A stubborn youth, refusing to acknowledge that such events happened because they had to happen…

"At least I know where your loyalties lie now, Malik," he said lowly, striding by the teen and disappearing into the back-shop.

He left the room in deathly silence. Yuugi watched Malik uncertainly, noticing how his hands had curled into tight, angry fists, and how his whole body trembled with some feeling he couldn't quite control.

"…_Fuck_," the blonde blurted out finally, holding his head in his hands. Yuugi winced at the obscenity.

"You ok?" he asked softly, finally putting down the mop he hadn't realised he was still holding.

"…Sorry, Yuugi," Malik ground out, evidently trying to get his temper back in check, "I shouldn't have…I mean…I just get so _mad_," he growled and stomped his foot, "Pharaoh is even worse than Ryou! He's just hating out of habit! He's not thinking – why won't anyone stop and think? Why won't anyone _open their eyes? _This terrible thing happened. It won't just go away. But no one wants to admit it-!"

"I know," Yuugi said gently, placing a hand on the distressed teen's shoulder, "You're right. Of course you're right. It's like you said, it's easier for us all to fight Bakura as a villain if we just forget Kul Elna," he hesitated, looking ashamed, "I also wanted to pretend it never happened."

Malik looked at him with empty eyes.

"Why?" he asked pleadingly, "You look at me and you feel bad about the things that happened to me. Don't deny it. Why just me? Why not him?"

"Bakura?" Yuugi said in surprise, "I don't know…you changed. It seems like Bakura is the same as ever."

"I was given a chance to change…" Malik said with a frown, "It's not like it just _happened_. I wasn't so different, when I came here at first. You know that. But I got the chance…Maybe I want to give someone else that chance now," his look became tinged with desperation, "Does that me so bad? So stupid?"

"No," Yuugi said immediately, "No. But you must have known Atemu wouldn't like it."

"…Yeah," Malik admitted, "I didn't want him to find out. I knew that the smallest thing would make him suspicious of me – and this isn't exactly a small thing. This is like high treason…" he sighed and glanced apprehensively at the door through which Atemu had left, "I should leave."

"What? No!" Yuugi said in alarm, "Malik, _relax, _Atemu will come around. He just doesn't know you. His head is full of…y'know…"

"The old me," Malik said flatly, "I can't blame him. I don't know how you and the others can find it in you to trust me. But Pharaoh…he'll never trust me, Yuugi. No more than he'll ever trust Bakura. He'll never be happy if I'm here."

"I don't care!" Yuugi said stubbornly, tugging on his arm, "_Stay. _You work here. He can't kick you out. I'll make him understand."

Malik was silent a moment.

"Alright. I'll stay," he said finally, "But Yuugi, you can't take my side in this. You have to stand with Pharaoh."

"What?" Yuugi questioned, astonished, "Why?"

"Why?" Malik repeated with a harsh laugh, "Come _on. _Because Ryou and Bakura are tearing each other apart every time they set eyes on one another. Because I stay in at nights in case I meet Mariku on a darkened street. Because we need proof that at least _one _light and dark can do more than destroy each other."

Yuugi looked confused and less than happy, but he nodded. Malik smiled weakly at him.

"Besides," he added, "It seems unnatural when you and Pharaoh are on opposite sides."

"I guess…" Yuugi said, "Alright. I won't fight with him. That would be horrible. But I'm going to believe in you, Malik. I know you wouldn't hurt us. That's not who you are."

Malik just laughed quietly, perhaps thinking about all the evidence to the contrary that the Pharaoh could undoubtedly quote.

"You should go to him," he said at length.

"Yeah…" Yuugi agreed, "He's calling me."

Malik frowned again as the shorter teen turned away.

"I didn't hear anything," he said apprehensively.

"Oh," Yuugi laughed, "Sorry. I meant he's calling me through our link. The thought thing, you know?"

He exited the room, dragging the mop and bucket with him. Malik's frown deepened.

* * *

Bakura leaned backwards against the nearest worktop, watching with boredom as Ryou washed a mountainous pile of dirty dishes in the kitchen's largest sink. They'd been here at least an hour now, and neither of them had spoken a word. The silence was strangely unnerving. Even Ryou's shouting was better than this.

Bakura had to admit, he'd been ever so slightly perplexed when he'd been informed that he'd be reporting for duty at twelve noon today. But now he understood – now the slyness of the Lot's owner, Mr Uchimura, had been explained to him. It was smart, really. This place was a semi-respectable eatery during the day, and a semi-disreputable club by night. The building never lay empty. There was never a time that it wasn't making money.

What he still couldn't fathom, however, was why he had to be here at this time. It was _daylight _outside, and Ryou finished at five. What kind of danger was he expected to get into? The construction workers on their lunch-breaks weren't like Angels' Lot's night-time clientele. They were infinitely more enamoured with their egg and bacon rolls than with the kid serving them.

He grimaced slightly to himself. He supposed this was what he had inadvertently signed up for. Just like the Angels' Lot building, he was never going to get a break. Hours of boredom during the day, hours of conflict after the sun went down.

Another thing that struck him as odd was that Ryou always seemed to be alone in this place. Sure, Kazuma had been with him some of the time when he'd been here before. But the other young employees never seemed to associate with him – or even spend any kind of time in the kitchen at all. Even right now, there was food cooking unwatched on the nearby hob and in the oven. Ryou checked on it every so often in between washing dishes, but Bakura was reasonably sure this violated quite a few safety codes. Not that safety codes applied here. There were a few other waiters and waitresses out on the floor, and they would shout in with an order every once in a while. But that was it. Ryou was pretty much running this show by himself.

"Doesn't this place even have a dishwasher?" Bakura asked gruffly, getting strangely irritated by the teen's robotic cleaning motions. He hardly seemed to be thinking about or even paying attention to what he was doing – it was doggedly and depressingly ingrained.

"You're looking at it," Ryou muttered in response, not looking up. If anything, his movements became even more mechanical. Maybe he had realised it annoyed his yami.

"In that case, why do they only have one?" Bakura pressed on – anything to fill this ghastly silence.

"Not always," Ryou said shortly, "But who wants to work on a Saturday?"

"Besides you?"

"What else do I have to do? It's not like I have friendsto 'hang out' with."

"What about Malik?" Bakura frowned. Ryou glanced up at him, clearly irked. Perhaps he'd briefly forgotten who he was talking to, because that short conversation had been borderline-civil.

"Damn. I forgot you know _everything _about me now," the teen said with acidic sarcasm, "Thanks to Malik, weirdly enough…"

"Seems like there isn't all that much to know…" Bakura muttered before pausing, "Was it Malik you ran into last night?"

He knew it hadn't been, of course. Malik had been stubbornly shut up in his bedroom when he had left the apartment the previous evening, and there had been nothing to suggest that he was contemplating a random trek into South Domino. But it seemed as convenient a way as any to bring up that subject which, bizarrely, had been bothering him a lot. Ryou looked at him sharply.

"You know it wasn't. I know you're staying with him, so don't look so indignant," the teen said warningly.

"Was it the Pharaoh?" Bakura asked tensely. He wasn't sure why the idea of his old adversary seeking out his light was so disturbing to him, but it was. Ryou gave one of those cold laughs that made Bakura secretly want to cover his ears.

"No, no," the teen said airily, "Pharaoh's already paid me his perfunctory visit. So _gracious _of him. Like the generous lord taking a fruit basket to the poor, I swear…"

Bakura wasn't sure what grabbed his attention more: the fact that Atemu had already managed to wheedle his way into Ryou's life, or the fact that Ryou was clearly not too appreciative of it.

"What did he want?" he demanded a little too commandingly. Ryou's eyes narrowed and he was clearly about to sneer something at him, but then he seemed to decide he liked the honest answer better.

"He was looking for you," he told him with a slight smirk. Bakura's expression hardened.

"And I suppose you told him where he could find me?" he snarled, wondering if Malik was being interrogated even as they spoke.

"No," Ryou shot back at him, "He asked during that brief interlude of about…oh, a _day_, when I thought you might _actually _leave me alone. I didn't know where you were, and I didn't care much either."

Bakura fell silent again, muddled up by simultaneous feelings of relief and that grating irritation that always came when Ryou was being ratty with him – which was all of the time, really. Again, there was that all-encompassing quiet, broken only by the muffled chatter from beyond the kitchen doors and the quiet slosh of the wash water.

"…It was Mariku," Ryou said suddenly, voice somewhat strained. Bakura's head jerked up.

"What?" he questioned in shock and confusion. He'd never expected to hear that name here.

"That was who I ran into last night," Ryou said, staring fixedly at the dish in his hands, "It was Mariku. Since you asked."

"…You're serious," Bakura said in realisation – slightly glad, since it would have been the least funny joke ever.

"Of course," Ryou said absently.

"But…why would seeing _him _make you late for work?" Bakura questioned suspiciously, "What, did you stop to chat_? _Or did he attack you?"

"You'd like to think everyone was out to attack me, wouldn't you?" Ryou said scathingly. If he had cared enough to look up in the course of this dialogue, he would have seen how Bakura's face was morphing more and more into a look of sheer disbelief.

"You've got to be kidding," the yami growled lowly, "You were _talking _to him? Are you an idiot? He's…dangerous."

"That's odd," Ryou said with blatantly false thoughtfulness, "I think I said something similar to Malik when he told me he'd been crazy enough to let _you _into his home…"

"Do _not _put me on the same level as that _psychopath_," Bakura snarled.

"You're just sore because he sent you to the Shadow Realm. Thanks for that, by the way. The experience did my body wonders," Ryou said bitingly, "You really think you're any better than him?"

"You seem to think he's better than me," Bakura said irritably, unable to comprehend the fact. He was also struggling with the idea that, to Ryou's mind, Mariku banishing him to the Shadow Realm had somehow been _his _fault.

"Anyone's better than you," Ryou said bluntly, "And, in case you hadn't noticed, he's leaving Malik alone. _That, _I can at least respect."

"You think he's doing that because he _cares _about Malik's feelings?" Bakura sneered derisively, "If he's letting Malik be, it's because he just can't be bothered going to see him. There's nothing honourable about it."

"Really? Does that mean you came to find me because you _care_?" Ryou snorted, "He knows that Malik is afraid of him. So he knows that staying away from him is for the best."

"I'm sure he's so good-hearted," Bakura said with a scowl, "But don't forget: staying away won't make Malik any less afraid of him, either."

"That's true," Ryou conceded, "And if you'd stayed away from me, it wouldn't have made me hate you any less…" he paused before smirking dryly, "But _not_ staying away from me only makes me hate you more."

"My options aren't great, are they?" Bakura said dully.

"Not really," Ryou said, smirk widening slightly.

They didn't speak again.

* * *

A few hours later, after finally escaping the clutches of Angels' Lot, Bakura hesitantly inserted his key into the door to Malik's apartment block. It still felt a little weird – to be a 'guest' and not an 'intruder'.

He climbed the stairs and, when he opened the door into the Egyptian teen's apartment, he was mildly surprised to be met by the smell of cooking. Looking at the clock, it made sense, though – it was around six o'clock, a normal time for an evening meal. He and Malik had just never happened to both be here at such a time.

The open-plan style of the apartment meant that the smell and warmth of the cooking had enveloped the whole living room as well as the small kitchenette. Malik stood at one of the counters with his back to him, apparently chopping something. Bakura raised an eyebrow. It was strange to see the blonde doing something as…domestic as cooking. But everyone had to eat, he supposed.

He shut the door behind him and the sound alerted Malik to his presence. He turned, violet eyes slightly startled, and then, much to Bakura's surprise, he smiled.

"Welcome back," he said brightly, adding whatever he had been slicing to a steaming pot on the hob. Bakura didn't reply, unaccustomed to having someone seem genuinely pleased to see him – Malik in particular, after their little showdown last night. He couldn't really fathom Malik these days. The teen had made a lot more sense to him when he'd been a creature of anger and vengeance.

"Where were you today?" Malik asked chirpily to combat the ensuing silence, "Did you have fun?"

"…I was with Ryou," Bakura replied shortly, hanging up his coat and going to stand opposite the teen, who was currently washing the chopping board in the sink.

"I'll take that as a 'no'," Malik laughed, "At least he didn't hit you again. Doesn't look like it, anyway."

"You seem to be in a good mood," Bakura said, slightly suspicious.

"Do I?" the blonde questioned vacantly, scrubbing the board with great concentration.

"…Aren't you still mad?" the yami asked apprehensively, half-expecting this was all a ruse to lull him into a false sense of security.

"About what?"

"Last night," Bakura muttered, folding his arms and looking away, "You know."

"Oh, _that. _I forgot," Malik said plaintively, startling the yami by reaching over and whapping him lightly over the head with the dripping chopping board, "Yes, I'm mad. Very mad. Make it up to me."

"How am I supposed to do that?" Bakura asked irritably, brushing soap-suds out of his hair. Malik blinked and then laughed.

"Wow - you asked 'how' and not 'why'," he remarked with a smile that made Bakura think of a kind of happiness he hadn't seen in this world since he'd got back, except in that girl, Mio, "That's progress."

"Shut up," Bakura grumbled, slightly unsettled by the Egyptian's lack of spite. He had stood in a kitchen for half the day with Ryou, and there had been nothing but anger and hate in that room. This was like the polar opposite. He couldn't just adjust.

"Answer all my questions tonight, ok?" Malik said, "Don't get angry and don't get suspicious. Then I won't be mad anymore."

"You don't seem all that mad…" Bakura commented dryly – perhaps at an inopportune moment, since Malik had just picked up his chopping knife again.

"Want a bet?" the Egyptian teen said with a grin, but Bakura was unnerved to see a flash of the old Malik in his eyes – not Mariku, not nearly _that _scary, but a little bit frightening nonetheless. It faded, though, almost immediately – and he was just smiling again. Joking. Like always.

"…Fine," Bakura agreed grudgingly, trying to shake off his momentary disquiet, "What do you want to know now?"

"Hey, it's not an…interrogation…" Malik told him, his voice faltering strangely at that word, "Wait until the food's ready."

Bakura looked at him blankly. Malik laughed again, freely and cheerfully. Nothing like Ryou's 'laugh'.

"You don't think I'd be so rude to cook for one person when there are two here?" he questioned in obvious amusement, "Or did you eat already?"

Bakura shook his head awkwardly.

"That's good. I haven't seen you eat once since you got back here. I was getting worried," Malik said, starting to spoon rice into two bowls.

"_Why?_" Bakura growled, taking a step back, "You've already done a lot more than you ever needed to. A lot more than even seems _normal_. Now you worry? Now you _feed me?_ What is this?"

"I'm asking the questions tonight," Malik said with a dark edge to his tone, scooping whatever he had concocted out of the pot and into the bowls, "And I told you not to get suspicious. I've had enough of _that _for one day."

Bakura frowned questioningly at him and the blonde sighed, letting his smile slip away.

"I had a bad day," he said sullenly, stabbing a fork into each bowl of food and shoving one in the yami's direction.

"Don't smile so much, then," Bakura replied, nodding as he accepted the meal, "Pretending is what makes me suspicious."

Malik blinked and then laughed softly before going and sitting cross-legged on the sofa with his food.

"Aren't you going to ask why it was a bad day?" he enquired.

"I thought you wanted to ask the questions tonight," Bakura said with a small smirk, taking a seat at the opposite end of the sofa.

"That's true…" Malik conceded, "Ok, then. Time for the pop quiz."

"I'll try and keep up…" Bakura said wryly, poking at his food with his fork, "What is this?"

"I don't name food; I just throw things in a pot. Just eat it, it tastes fine," Malik said with a dismissive wave of his hand, swallowing a mouthful to demonstrate the safeness of the food, "First question. Your village. Was it evil?"

If Bakura had had food in his mouth at that moment, he probably would have spat it back out, affronted.

"You approach the subject with such grace, Malik," he said scathingly.

"Sorry," the Egyptian teen said mildly, "It's stuff like this that I need to know before I decide once and for all which side I'm coming down on. Though I suppose it doesn't matter toomuch, since some people are already convinced of which side I'm taking. But I'd like to know the facts, anyway."

"Even if everyone in Kul Elna was 'evil'…" Bakura muttered, "Would that make their murders excusable?"

"…No, I suppose not," Malik admitted, "Or maybe it depends how 'evil' they were. 'Evil' is pretty vague. Were they murderers or…?"

Bakura snorted.

"No," he said steadfastly, stabbing savagely at his meal, "I'm sure the Pharaoh would love for everyone to think so. They were farmers when conditions were favourable. Scavengers when conditions were less favourable. And thieves when things became desperate."

"Is that why…they were chosen?"

"Not particularly," Bakura said with a shrug, not looking at him, "That probably helped justify what happened, but it was mainly just convenient. Kul Elna was…a reclusive place. Didn't associate much with the rest of Egypt, not even to trade. So no one missed it, once it was gone. Not many even noticed. Kul Elna was the perfect target for that kind of ritual. It couldn't even be considered wiping it off the map, because it was never on the map. They just erased something that practically never existed."

"They _almost_ erased it," Malik reminded him, looking at him pointedly, "What age were you?"

"Is that your second question?"

"Why does that matter?"

"I was eight," Bakura muttered, looking away again, "Ok?"

"It's not really ok…" Malik said morosely, "And what age were you when you were sealed away in the Millennium Ring?"

Bakura faltered.

"…I'm not sure," he admitted lowly, "I kind of stopped keeping track after…"

He trailed off. Malik looked thoughtful.

"Right now, in this body, you can't be older than twenty-one," he said finally, "Maybe younger. Would that be about right?"

"I don't know…I thought I was older than that," Bakura said uncertainly.

"Heh. Weird," Malik chuckled to himself. Upon noticing Bakura looking his way questioningly, he laughed out loud, "Oh, that wasn't really relevant. I was just curious."

"Great…" Bakura said sarcastically, going back to eating.

"Next. You and Ryou still have that 'connection' thing, yeah?" Malik pressed on.

"You already knew that."

"Yeah, but…I mean…what isit? "

"What are you talking about?" Bakura asked dubiously, eyebrows raised.

"You know what I mean," Malik said with evident frustration, "It's clearly not a literal 'link', because then there'd be some kind of weird rope thing running from here to South Domino. So...what is it that...connects you two?"

"...Oh. I've never actually thought about that," Bakura said, furrowing his brows as he proceeded to do so now, "I don't really know. It's just..._there. _Using it isn't something I've ever had to think consciously about. If you want to move your finger, you just do it. You're not aware of exactly how you're doing it..."

"And what does it tell you?" Malik asked apprehensively.

"I don't really know..." Bakura replied, starting to look frustrated with his own lack of understanding, "I can use it to find him. Sometimes. Other times it randomly doesn't work, I don't know if he can block it or something..."

"So you can't hear his thoughts?" Malik interjected abruptly. Bakura stared at him for a long moment before snorting.

"Of course not," he said, shaking his head, "That's crazy."

"...Yeah, I guess," Malik conceded with a small smile. He was looking very intently into his bowl. Although they had agreed that Malik was asking the questions on this occasion, Bakura found he couldn't stop the next one falling from his lips as it occurred to him with sickening suddenness.

"Malik, are you and Mariku still...?" he started, trailing off when the blonde's shoulders visibly hunched up and tensed.

"Of course we are," Malik snapped defensively.

"...You still haven't seen him, have you?" Bakura asked, though he had a feeling he would have known about it if the two had crossed paths.

"No," Malik said flatly, "But I can feel him there."

"Which means he can feel you," Bakura finished with a grim nod, "He knows where you are."

"Maybe not," Malik said with a degree of optimism that he clearly didn't really feel, "Maybe I've been able to block him out, like Ryou...it could be a subconscious thing..."

"Or he's just messing with you," Bakura suggested dryly, "Not to crush your hopes or anything."

"Thanks..." Malik muttered, turning away.

Bakura wondered if he should tell him that his darkness was very nearby – within the city, at the very least – and that Ryou had actually stopped to exchange pleasantries with him. It didn't seem like the greatest idea in the world. He couldn't pinpoint exactly why he felt the need to protect Malik's apparently fragile peace of mind, but for whatever reason the thought of sending the blonde into terrified, hyperventilating hysterics was really not appealing to him. Maybe it was just that seeing him in such a state would most likely destroy whatever respect Bakura held for him.

"You remember when we challenged Mariku during Battle City?" he asked instead.

"When we lost to him, you mean?" Malik replied plaintively, still not looking at him, "How could I forget?"

"...He mentioned it today," Bakura said stiffly, "He blames me for it."

Malik blinked a few times, seemingly trying to catch up with his train of thought.

"Ryou?" he questioned at length. When Bakura nodded he prompted further, "Blames you for what?"

"The fact that Mariku sent us both to the Shadows," Bakura growled lowly.

"Well you did challenge him..." Malik pointed out.

"It was your idea, remember?" Bakura retorted. The blonde's face went slightly pink and he smiled impishly, "Yeah, you do remember. I kind of thought that was the one thing the brat _wouldn't _call me on, since I did it to help _you _out..."

"Sure you did," Malik said with a snort.

"Ok, I did it because we made a deal. But if we'd won, the outcome would have been favourable to you."

"Uh huh. Just so you know, the fact that Ryou and I are friends _now _doesn't mean that he doesn't still totally hate the 'me' from back then," Malik told him, "Mariku was a totally separate personality, but when I think back, I can't even relate to myself from that time. It's like looking at another person..."

"An insane person?" Bakura suggested dully.

"A kid who'd never been taught the basics, mostly..." Malik said with a somewhat sad smile.

"...I still don't see why the Shadow Realm was my fault," Bakura said almost sulkily.

"It wasn't, really," Malik said with a shrug, "Not completely, anyway. But you're forgetting one important detail. To Ryou's mind, _everything _is your fault."

"What?" Bakura questioned, looking genuinely surprised as well as thoroughly irritated, "...Everything?"

"Didn't you notice?" Malik said absently, "Come on. His life started going downhill the moment you came into the picture. You're, like...his focal point for hate. You think the Shadow Realm example is unreasonable? Every single thing that goes wrong in his world is your fault, to his mind. You are the bogey-man, Bakura."

"...That's...stupid," Bakura muttered, "Beyond stupid..."

"Is it?" Malik questioned without expecting any answer – his slightly vacant expression alerted Bakura that he was thinking a lot and about to divulge those thoughts, "Seems pretty smart, really. A pain in the ass for you, maybe, but it's smart. It means he can deal with things. Because you're 'bad' and no one can change that – you're like a constant. And you're easy to blame. If everything's your fault, he can keep fighting you. If he hates you, he doesn't need to hate himself. You see...?"

"What the hell did he do before I came back?" Bakura demanded.

"The exact same," Malik said softly, "You don't have to be here for him to hate you and blame you."

"So that's what keeps him going?" Bakura said incredulously, "He _lives _off that hate...?"

"I didn't say I approved. Only that it's kind of smart, as a method of self-preservation," Malik stated flatly, "But yeah, that pretty much sums it up."

"That's so...pathetic," Bakura sneered, "It just shows how weak he is. He can't take the blame for anything or accept bad things and move on. How pitiful is he, letting his whole life revolve around hating one person, and blaming them for things that others were accountable for...?"

He trailed off, expression stony and insulted, when Malik burst out laughing.

"What?" he demanded furiously, "What could possibly be _funny_...?"

"Nothing," Malik replied between sniggers, "Just thinking. About you. And Pharaoh."

Bakura opened his mouth only to shut it again. There really wasn't a lot he could say.

* * *

_**Lol. Bakura just kind of owned himself.**_

_**Ah, please don't be too hard on Atemu. He means well. Really.**_

_**By the way, Bakura knows about dishwashers because he saw Malik emptying his. He was quite fascinated.**_

_**Also, I noticed something. Wa-ay back in chapter 3, when Atemu was shocked by the idea that Ryou drinks, Kazuma says 'What nineteen year-old doesn't?' That was something of a fail on my part...Since I live in the UK (where we can drink at 18 and most of us are alcoholics by 18 and a half), I forgot that the legal drinking age is 21 in the US and 20 in Japan. Whilst it's never explicitly stated exactly where Domino is meant to be, most people tend to assume it's one of those two...oops? xD But I guess that, like here in Britain, a lot of young people in America and Japan start drinking before they're strictly old enough...? Or is that just us? xD Looks like Ryou is even more hard-core than even I initially thought...**_

_**Big, huge, morbidly obese thank yous go out to pride1289, , Voltrix Zee Horo, ScarlettKuasta, Schizo-of-Destiny, Kiri-chan220, Ceilo, Crimson315, KyoxSakiFan, ACE329, PharaohDeli, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, Twilight-Imp-626, scrawling purple ink, Tenshi no Toki, subaru1999, kuaispeed, AnimeLoverAngel, Yaoi-Lover-Chris, felton-fanatic, Niilan, gliitch, ONIX-21, Atomic Lightbulb, Airyballoon, Kuwakaskei, BloodyPoisonKiss, new-found, I Dance The Tango, X-Panda-Chan-X, chibi heishi, consumedbylove, FoxyHottie, Thief Mistress Thorn, Bokmal14 and Suicidal Skies. My life (my life) would suck (would suck) without yooou :]**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	13. Over & Over

_**Chapter 13:**__** Over & Over**_

The next few weeks passed not without incident, but with so many incidents of a similar nature that it was possible to establish a routine of sorts.

This routine was far from pleasant for most involved. Bakura realised quickly that he would have to familiarise himself with the notion that every time he set foot in Angels' Lot, he had to be ready to fight an all-out battle – and not just with the club's determinedly lecherous patrons. Ryou had not been kidding when he'd said he wanted to see how long his darkness would last in the post of his protector. Bakura would never admit it, but more than once his hikari's snappy remarks, occasional tantrums and frequent snubs had almost made him give up and walk out. He gave as good as he got, but even when Ryou fell silent first in an argument, white-faced and tight-lipped, it didn't feel like winning – perhaps because Bakura knew he would be made to regret the petty victory later. And, in all honesty, hurting his light brought him little pleasure or satisfaction. It just felt pointless. Kind of pathetic.

He wouldn't give up, though. Not because he cared. Not even because of the money. Because, somewhere along the way, this had become a competition. Ryou was trying to break him down, right? The teen knew that he couldn't _force_ him to leave, so he was going to get on his nerves and chip away at his sanity until he admitted he couldn't take it anymore and left of his own accord. But, to Bakura, that would be the most shameful show of weakness possible. Losing to Ryou was a sickening thought.

They both knew that something – some_one – _was going to crack eventually. They didn't know what or when, but it was clear that such an intense conflict couldn't go on forever.

Malik maintained resolutely that fighting was better than silence, because fighting was at a least a sort of communication. Bakura supposed that was a psychology thing. Malik was always there to placate him when he came storming in after 'time with Ryou', except when work or college prevented it. The blonde would listen and then he would talk until the day's events seemed not so terrible. Bakura found it bizarre, though not necessarily bad, to be in the presence of someone who was so consistently positive and who could produce such logical and believable reasons for why the whole situation wasn't just shit. Malik; who never seemed to despair, who would smile when Ryou would scowl, and who was steadfast in his belief that Bakura was not nearly as monstrous as he liked to brag.

Perhaps the most surprising part of those first few weeks for Bakura was the realisation that he really liked Malik, in a grudging sort of way.

Malik insisted that things with Ryou would change. And he was right – though probably not in the way he hoped to be. Because as time passed, Bakura noticed that Ryou shouted at him less and less. He didn't know the reason – maybe the boy realised that shouting alone wouldn't get rid of him, maybe he just couldn't summon the energy anymore. But whatever the case, as the weeks went by, the hot scintillating anger (which Bakura was just getting used to) seemed to be reigned in and replaced with something quieter, colder and altogether more unnerving than any unchecked bawling. The periods of crushing silence between them became lengthier and more frequent, to the extent that even Malik started looking a little uneasy when he heard about them. Because silence was _not _communication. It was the opposite. It was denying someone's existence completely. Bakura seethed inwardly over it – it was Ryou changing tactics, and winning. The silence was bad. Shouting had been infinitely more bearable.

Kazuma seemed genuinely impressed that he kept coming back, not least because, although the nasty baseball-bat-induced bruises on Bakura's head faded, they were quickly replaced by others – with interest. The yami was lucky that Ryou was not naturally predisposed to violence – otherwise he probably would have ended up hospitalised after about two days at the Lot. But still, sometimes it seemed that words alone were not strong enough to fully display the teen's very, very deep loathing. On one particularly passionate occasion, Bakura had to duck to avoid a (thankfully unused) frying pan flung his way. The old steak-knife threat never came to fruition, but they had a few impressive scraps in that kitchen – with Bakura usually coming off worst. Since he understood that his deal with Kazuma included taking a certain amount of physical abuse, he only hit back on the rare occasions when things were getting really out of hand. Usually, Ryou raised his hands mainly as a warning – not to inflict any serious damage. But sometimes…sometimes Bakura, and other circumstances, pushed him too far.

It was strange, but Bakura found that he adjusted to Ryou's temper more quickly and easily than he did to Malik's smiles and civility. He was well-accustomed to being despised – though, admittedly, not by his light. But being treated kindly was a much more intimidating experience.

Malik himself didn't have the greatest few weeks, either. The blithe, positive façade he kept up at home wasn't really a façade at all, because home had quickly become the place he was happiest.

College didn't change. College was his neutral-zone. He didn't have friends there, but he didn't have enemies either. He went to lectures, he took notes, he left. That was it.

But his hours at the Kame Game Shop quickly became ordeals to be dreaded. The place that had been like a home to him, the only place in which he had ever felt almost as comfortable as he did in solitude, was now like a minefield that he had to navigate almost every day. Now that he had Atemu as an ally, Otogi had ceased to bother hiding his dislike for the blonde. Malik had to admit, he was surprised – he had always known that, following the events of Battle City, he wasn't Otogi's _favourite _person, but not even he had suspected that the green-eyed youth found him as distasteful as his current behaviour suggested. Atemu, in turn, seemed glad to have someone who would stand with him against Malik's perceived treachery, and between them they were managing to make the blonde's working hours suitably hellish. Malik took the unpleasant treatment and accompanying isolation without outward complaint – he couldn't really find it in him to harbour much resentment for the untrusting pair. He'd always felt that he'd never paid enough penance for his past deeds, so maybe now…maybe this was retribution.

Of course, that didn't mean that he didn't hate every minute of it.

And on top of everything, there was that constant, omnipresent anxiety – that _fear _gnawing like a rabid animal at his gut that his darkness was finally going to put in an appearance. He had a horrible feeling that Mariku was toying with him – lying in wait, watching as his nerves were slowly shredded, laughing every time he glanced nervously over his shoulder or took fright at the slightest unexpected movement. Malik was very much aware that he was fast becoming a complete nervous wreck. He studied psychology, so he knew about that stuff.

He wondered what Atemu would think if he knew that having Bakura at his apartment actually helped him feel slightly safer.

As for Yuugi and Atemu, their giddy joy at being reunited was quickly evaporating now that they found themselves in serious disagreement over a matter that neither of them was willing to compromise on. The honeymoon was over, as Jonouchi put it. Yuugi had reluctantly complied with Malik's request that he didn't help him in his apparent rematch with the Pharaoh, but the atmosphere in the Mutou household had been decidedly less than harmonious ever since the conflict, which seemed somewhat petty to Yuugi's eyes, had begun. He and Atemu weren't _arguing, _in the true sense of the word (like Ryou and Bakura), but when they were together it was necessary to avoid the slightly overbearing subjects of Malik, Ryou and Bakura, otherwise something dangerously close to a heated debate was prone to erupt.

All in all, those first few weeks were all about readjusting. Three people who had been wiped from existence for three years were suddenly back in the world of the living, apparently on a permanent basis – of course some readjustment would be required. But it seemed that no one was adjusting all that well – least of all Ryou. The white-haired teen had seen his share of turbulence over the past few years, and as a result he was vastly more flexible to unpleasant changes than any of the others. But this was one change he refused to accept. The idea that Bakura was back for good and that he was powerless to do anything about it was unbearable to him. So he fought. He kicked and screamed and struggled, even though he knew in his heart that it was useless – he couldn't just make his darkness disappear. But he kept fighting, like a desperate child, blindly, angrily, hatefully-

Memories of intense fear and suffering, such as the ones branded onto Ryou's mind, could drive the most rational person to the most irrational course of action.

But perhaps even Ryou would have faltered if he had any inkling as to the huge, if slow, changes taking place within his darkness. Of course, he had no idea, and in all honesty, even Bakura wasn't fully aware of them. But that first time he felt the bitter stab of remorse, after hurting Malik, was not the last time. It returned again and again – sometimes with Malik, sometimes with Ryou, sometimes when he was alone and just thinking of some past cruelty. It was strange and intermittent – as if some drug in his body that kept him unfeeling would wear off from time to time, and there would be the crouching _remorse_, sickening and painful. The same applied to a surprising variety of other emotions – including even the occasional brief moment of amusement or near-contentment (these occurring exclusively in Malik's company, it must be said). It was unnerving for him. For any other person, those feelings would have been the most natural things in the world – but for Bakura, they were alien and threatening. After all, he'd almost forgotten what it was like to be human.

He didn't know what was happening. No one else even knew anything was happening. But things were happening. And, after the spirits had been back in the living world for about a month, things started happening _fast. _

* * *

"You're late, Touzoku," Kazuma remarked as Bakura entered the Angels' Lot kitchen through the staff door. The yami glowered darkly at him and slammed the door pointedly behind him.

"Hey, I didn't say I blamed you," Kazuma said with a chuckle.

"I'm so glad," Bakura said sullenly, going to hang up his coat in the adjoining cloakroom.

"Lucky for you, Sato must be off drownin' some puppies or pushin' E's on old ladies, cos he ain't here," Kazuma called through to him, "But keep an eye out, man, there're plenty other sick fucks who'll wander into this dump. Hurry and get out there, Ryou's already workin' the room."

"I'm sure he is," Bakura muttered irritably, leaving the cloakroom and striding through the swing doors into the main body of the club. Gods, he hated this place. Every night, the same goddamned music, the same dirty old men and dirtier young men, the inevitable drunken brawl. The same pissy Ryou.

He quickly located the afore-mentioned (Ryou, not the dirty men, though the two went together disturbingly often) and, as had become his custom, took up the furthest away vantage point from which he could still see his light clearly and quickly step in to snatch him from the greasy clutches of some lecherous shit-head should the need arise. For now, however, the need wasn't likely to arise, since Ryou was currently sitting – yes, he'd actually sat down for once – and talking to the one Angels' Lot customer he didn't hate. Some young guy. He looked young, anyway – he had the sort of face that was hard to put any precise age to. Bakura forgot his name. The guy was something of a regular in here now, but from what Bakura understood from Kazuma, he'd only started frequenting the club about a month ago – just after he'd taken up the thankless task of keeping Ryou out of trouble. The guy's first visit here was probably meant as a one-off occasion – a curiosity-sating glimpse of Domino's seeping underbelly – but he seemed to have developed a pathetic sort of crush on Ryou, and now came at least two or three nights a week, like some devoted puppy. A sardonic smirk tugged at Bakura's mouth as he folded his arms and settled himself against the wall. The guy was clearly completely clueless about the seedier side of life, and he probably considered Ryou to be some scandalous, highly experienced night-creature – when in fact the teen knew less about seduction and sex than your average schoolboy.

At least, that was true of the old Ryou. Maybe now…?

Bakura shook his head, feeling faintly nauseous.

Ryou caught his yami's eye for a brief moment before going back to what he had been saying, giving no sign of recognition or even the habitual loathing. Bakura scowled. It was quite possibly the most annoying thing ever when Ryou just brushed his very existence off entirely, like a negligible patch of flaking paint on the wall. A swift glare would have been much preferable.

He turned his attention back to Ryou's awkward admirer to distract himself from that grating irritation. He wondered what Ryou saw in him, if he saw anything at all. The guy wasn't in any way remarkable: short, neat, ash-brown hair; small, narrow-framed glasses (not the black plastic monstrosities that were the current fashion); a complexion that could have been called pale if he weren't sitting next to Ryou. He wasn't brawny, but he wasn't exactly slightly-built either. Just average. The only thing remotely remarkable about him was the fact that he was so stunningly unremarkable.

Ryou _seemed_ to genuinely like him, though. Maybe he liked that plainness. Maybe it seemed safe.

Bakura snapped out of his musings as the pair's conversation abruptly terminated. The third member of the little party – a severe-looking older man who usually, though not always, accompanied Ryou's devotee – had gotten to his feet and barked some brusque order, presumably indicating that it was time to leave. He ignored the twin looks of annoyance he received, merely throwing some money onto the table to settle up the bar tab and pulling on his coat. Ryou, disappointment lurking behind his typically neutral expression, also stood and gathered up the ungraciously given cash with a movement of his lips that Bakura intuitively knew to be a forced thank you. The teen then turned away from the table and headed back towards the bar, his face sullen with the prospect of spending the next few hours surrounded only by customers he despised.

Bakura blinked in mild surprise when the younger man suddenly caught up to Ryou, touching his wrist lightly to get his attention. The yami saw him smile apologetically and say something quietly in the teen's ear, and he saw Ryou's expression brighten ever so slightly, his cheeks flush a delicate shade of pink. He saw the man discreetly press another bill into the teen's hand and then laughingly brush off Ryou's embarrassed attempts to give it back. He saw the man leave, and he saw Ryou watch him go.

Bakura's crimson eyes narrowed. There must be something about that guy he wasn't seeing. He'd _never _seen any other customer whisper anything in Ryou's ear without getting 'the glare' and/or hauled out of the club by the nearest bouncer.

Ryou returned to the bar with a soft sigh, reluctantly pocketing the probably generous tip as he went. As he opened the cash register to put the rest of the money inside, Kazuma sidled up beside him. Bakura, close enough to hear any discourse, kept an ear open.

"I saw that, man," Kazuma said with a mischievous grin.

"Saw what?" Ryou returned evenly, though the pink tinge returned to his cheeks and he kept his eyes trained a little too firmly on the till.

"Aw come on, man, don't gimme that," Kazuma laughed, elbowing him teasingly, "Just now, your man…wassis name, Hideki? Come on, I saw that little parting whisper. Was he telling you which hotel to come to or…?"

"He just said he'd come again soon," Ryou said shortly, "Don't be disgusting."

"That so? So is he bringing his parents to introduce you to 'em?" Kazuma said, folding his arms. He chuckled when Ryou shot him a questioning frown, "Seriously, man, I think he likes you. Like, proper likes you. Flowers on Valentines Day and picnics in the park, and all that kinda thing."

"That's ridiculous…" Ryou mumbled, evidently not knowing where to look now that he'd finished putting the money away. Kazuma's expression became more solemn, and he reached out and turned the teen's face towards him to look him in the eye.

"Don't rule it out, man," he said seriously, "He's not from around here, is he? He seems respectable enough. If he likes you, he could be your ticket out of this dump."

"I…" Ryou started, staring at him, "I won't use someone like that!"

"You wouldn't be 'using' him," Kazuma said plaintively, "You like him, don't you?"

Ryou flushed bright red.

"He's…very polite…" he mumbled before swallowing hard and jerking out of Kazuma's grasp, "This is stupid."

He walked away swiftly and went into the kitchen, looking rather amusingly flustered.

"…But then again," Kazuma said suddenly, turning his head lazily to look at Bakura, as if to confirm he'd been completely aware of his eavesdropping, "Wouldn't it suck for you if he took that way out? You bust your butt keepin' him outta trouble, then he goes off with some square without a backward glance…?"

"You just told him to stick close to that Hideki guy, and now you're telling me to interfere?" Bakura questioned dryly, raising an eyebrow, "Do you just like messing with people's lives…?"

"Just mixing things up, man," Kazuma said with a small smile, "Might be the only way to make an outcome everyone's happy with. And by everyone, I mean Ryou."

"I won't even pretend to know what you're talking about…" Bakura muttered, "Look. If the brat hooks up with some law school graduate who'll whisk him back to the nice side of town, that just means I won't have to bother with him anymore."

Kazuma snorted.

"Yeah, right," he said, rolling his eyes, "If you could let him go that easily, you'd have stopped comin' here a long time ago. And don't tell me you come here just for the money, or just to punish yourself for whatever the hell it was you did to him before. No one would put themselves through this kind of shit if they didn't want something back."

"So what do I want?" Bakura sneered – but he was genuinely curious. He was irked but not really surprised when Kazuma just chuckled and shrugged.

"All I know is…" the brown-haired man said conclusively, "Even though that guy could be one way for Ryou to get out of this shit-hole…well, he looks like he'd be a pretty boring way out, doesn't he?"

"What difference does that make?" Bakura said irritably, "If the brat wants out of here so badly, he can't be too picky about the route."

"There'd be no point in him escaping this Hell just to wind up miserable something else," Kazuma pointed out, "Anyway, that Hideki guy don't look nearly tough enough to deal with that kid for the long haul. Ryou'd just be walking on eggshells the whole time. One tantrum and that guy'd crumble to dust."

"He'd never need to see that side of him," Bakura said decisively. When Kazuma arched a questioning eyebrow at him, he continued with an awkward frown, "Don't judge the brat based on what he's like around _me. _That's not the real him. It's like some part of him that I…_twisted_ or…something…"

"Man, you are an asshole," Kazuma said, palming his forehead, "But at least ya seem to know it."

"I didn't say I was sorry," Bakura snapped.

"Whatever. What ya doing out here, anyway? Ryou's in the kitchen – get in there!" Kazuma ordered, pointed.

"Why? It's not like he's in any danger in there…" Bakura muttered. He hated being alone in that kitchen with his light. It was like sitting on a ticking time-bomb.

"There's a back door, man. Ya can't be too careful."

Bakura grumbled a string of obscenities under his breath but moved to obey. Just as he reached the kitchen doors, he turned back to Kazuma, brow furrowed in an almost suspicious expression.

"Doesn't it bother you?" he asked.

"What?" Kazuma questioned, apparently perplexed.

"That men show such an interest in…him," Bakura elaborated, jerking his head indicatively in the direction of the kitchen, "And that he seems to…'prefer' men, if he prefers anything. It doesn't disgust you?"

"Feelings are feelings, man," Kazuma replied bluntly, though he looked a little embarrassed by the question, "Last I heard, they weren't ruled over by things like gender."

"How understanding of you."

"Whaddaya want me to say?" the taller man growled with frustration, "Ok, I won't lie. Growing up, I was your typical macho-man prick, alright? I didn't think twice about callin' a guy a fag and breakin' his nose. But now I've lived in this shitty place long enough and seen enough normal- enough _straight _relationships turn sour to know better. I hear it all the time – the girl's sleepin' around, or the guy's raisin' hands to her. So I figure, if two people can _actually _care about each other, even if they are both guys or both girls or whatever, then that's gotta be a damn good thing."

"Again," Bakura said dully, "How understanding of you."

"Not that it matters, anyway," Kazuma said grimly, turning to look at the congregation of sickos who made up the Lot's clientele, "'Love' doesn't happen here. Hah, it's practically banned. If someone wants to get serious with a person working here, it's pretty much their responsibility to get both of them out of this place before things get ugly."

"…Ugly?"

Kazuma glanced sideways at him, raising an eyebrow.

"Get serious, man," he said, "Whaddaya think that asshole Sato would do if he saw Ryou gettin' cosy with another guy in here? Hell, what would _you _do? Could you take it?"

"It really wouldn't bother me," Bakura snarled. But it would. Just not for the reasons Kazuma clearly thought. Just because it would unnerve him to see Ryou act like that in full view of almost a hundred people, because it would be so brazen, so disgustingly out of character…

But maybe that was wrong. What did he actually know of Ryou's true character these days…?

"Why you still standing there?" Kazuma asked, jolting him out of his thoughts, "Kitchen, man."

"_Alright_," Bakura hissed, finally going through the swing doors. They flopped shut behind him with a sound like a funeral drum.

He was somewhat relieved to see that Mio had snuck into the kitchen when he hadn't been looking, and so Ryou was blessedly occupied with her chatter – meaning that Bakura had time to mentally steel himself for the inevitable conflict to come. He stood near the door and silently observed the pair who, with their exteriors of untainted beauty and innocence, looked like some bizarre inversion of the Madonna and Child superimposed onto this dank and dingy backdrop of sin.

It seemed that Mio was contesting the fact that it was time for her to go to bed, and Ryou was chiding her gently with a small half-smile on his usually aloof face. Bakura narrowed his eyes slightly. He'd watched his light with customers, and knew that he was always very polite and proper. It wasn't the same _kind _of politeness as before, though; it was cool, curt and clipped, nothing like the bubbly, affectionate and warm respect with which he used to treat all living things. The only time he ever saw a glimmer, a faint dilution, of the old Ryou was when he was with Mio. Whenever he could snatch a moment he would talk to her and play with her, and just generally indulge her, and it was the only time Bakura saw him looking even a little happy. He clearly adored her, and it was just as obvious that the feeling was reciprocated. Hah, Ryou and Mio. They sounded like a comedy double-act.

"But I'm not even sleepy…" he heard Mio whine as she pouted imploringly up at Ryou.

"Yes you are," he replied plaintively, "And you've got pre-school tomorrow. Come on, it's already way late."

And it was, especially by little-kid standards. Bakura, who knew absolutely nothing about child-rearing, was vaguely aware that the late nights here couldn't be healthy for such a young child. But what else were her parents supposed to do? Baby-sitters weren't always available, and she was way too small to be left at home alone…

The solution was a little odd. Next to the cloakroom and staff toilets, there was a small, windowless storage room used for holding the incoming crates of alcoholic drinks before they were moved to a refrigerator or the bar. And in a corner of this room, there was 'Mio's Spot'. Kazuma had brought in a bunch of cushions and blankets from home, and it was here that Ryou arranged them into a make-shift bed each night she had to accompany her father to work. He stacked piles of boxes strategically around the area to conceal her from view, and he always locked the door, whilst Mio was equipped with a cell phone on speed-dial with which she could contact either Ryou or Kazuma if the slightest problem arose. Despite these precautions, and Kazuma's insistence that people around here knew she was his daughter and wouldn't dare harm her, Ryou still checked on her fretfully every quarter of an hour or so, sometimes more. It could get annoying.

"There's a point where protectiveness becomes obsessive," Bakura commented irritably after over two hours of watching his light scuttle back and forth.

Ryou shot him a look of deepest disdain and loathing but didn't say a single word before continuing on his way.

Bakura growled lowly. This indifference. It was so…

What? Humiliating? Infuriating?

Yes. But maybe, most of all, it was just frightening. It felt like _losing. _He couldn't fight that coldness – it was immoveable, untouchable. Ryou made himself unreachable, and he was left helpless.

Helplessness. Weakness. Unbearable.

"It won't make it go away, you know," Bakura sneered at his light's retreating back. Ryou paused but didn't turn around.

"You know what I mean, don't you?" Bakura continued indolently, folding his arms.

"Can't say that I do," Ryou responded blandly, but he still wasn't walking away. His attention had been caught. That was fatal.

"Uh huh," Bakura said, his next words seeming to sear his throat even as he said them before clogging the air with their hideous presence, "It won't change that fact that there was another little girl you failed to protect."

The effect was immediate. The fury crackled through Ryou's entire frame like a wave of electricity – Bakura could see it even before his light whirled around to face him, eyes blazing. His face was alarmingly white.

"Don't you _dare _talk about her," Ryou hissed dangerously.

Bakura sincerely hoped that his inner feeling of 'oh shit' didn't show on his face.

"Why not?" he taunted regardless, unable to let this go, unwilling to slip back into the background and be dismissed again. Ryou's eyes were on him now, and maybe that was what he had wanted.

"I'm warning you," Ryou said darkly, "Shut up, right now."

Bakura forced himself to smirk, forced his body to keep its casual stance. It was hard, so much harder than it should have been.

"Does it hurt _right here, _hikari?" he asked pleasantly, touching a hand to the left side of his own chest, "Do you still feel so pathetic because you couldn't save her…?"

"Shut _up_!" Ryou all but screamed at him. Bakura realised dimly that, if it was a reaction he had wanted, he had officially got one. Ryou snatched up a nearby glass and hurled it at him, probably nor caring if it shattered into a thousand pieces and severed an artery. As it happened, it clipped Bakura's raised arm painfully before clunking to the floor, cracking but not breaking. But then Ryou was suddenly just _there, _right in front of him, shouting and kicking and clawing and just trying to _hurt _him any way he could.

"Don't talk about her!" he was screaming, "You don't know anything! _Anything! _It's not _fair, _why are you here? Why you and not her? You don't deserve a second chance! I hate you, _I hate you_-!"

Bakura didn't even try to hit back. He grappled as best he could, trying to grab hold of Ryou's wrists, shoulders, anything to hold him still, but he didn't hit back. And all the way through the teen's ferocious assault, a voice in his mind kept saying, _This isn't Ryou, this can't be Ryou, can't be…_

Nothing Bakura did could restrain his light. He fell still only when all his energy was expended, coughing and gasping for breath. Bakura kept a tight grip on his shoulders in case he somehow got a second wind. Ryou stood glaring daggers up at him, two spots of fierce crimson burning in his pale cheeks.

His eyes were dry, though. Ryou never cried, Bakura had come to realise. It was as if his tears, like everything else, had been frozen to ice inside him.

They looked at each other in a silence that seemed almost eerie after the animated struggle. Two pairs of eyes boring into each other – livid brown and conflicted crimson. Bakura didn't know what to feel, besides the customary gloom and irritation that usually followed one of these battles. But this wasn't just another petty fight. This had gone a lot deeper. Should he feel regret? Sadness? Pity…?

Emotions like that still didn't come naturally to him.

He half-parted his lips even though he didn't know what he wanted to say. The words that _needed _to be said hung tantalisingly in the space between them – words that might have made all of this just a little bit better and taken some of the pain away. _I'm sorry. I should have said those things. Sorry._

But he said nothing.

Ryou broke eye-contact first. He seemed to notice, for the first time, Bakura's hands still gripping his shoulders, and he jerked away in one quick, repulsed motion.

"Gods…" he muttered, "That was what you wanted, wasn't it? I'm so _stupid…_"

_Don't call yourself stupid. Don't put yourself down._

Still Bakura said nothing. But when Ryou shook his head numbly and turned away, he knew that he would never mentioned Amane again. Not with scorn. Not like that.

He watched Ryou walk away, silent and untouchable again, and he wondered, not for the first time, whether he might have damaged just a little bit of his light's sanity along with his happiness.

_Damn._

* * *

_**End chapter, I think…**_

_**Ugh. The next chapter is about the same evening. It was actually meant to be just one chapter, but it would have been waaay too long. Sorry the update was a bit slower than usual – it turns out I actually have to pay attention and work at university. Who'da thunkit?**_

_**Don't worry. Malik's back next chapter :D (Why is that always a cause for celebration…?)**_

_**Like I said, it seems that uni (unlike good old school...) actually does require me to devote quite a lot of time to it, so I'm afraid updates might be rather sparse for a while now. I have a comprehensive, fool-proof plan written out for this story, though, so I will get through it eventually. **_

_**The usual adoring thanks go out to AnimeLoverAngel, Ceilo, 0Capella0, Tunazap, stevenlover101, saturnoutlaw, Wolfwhispers, felton0fanatic, hiddencry, albino-yaoi, Tenshi no Toki, t recorder, pride1289, SuicidalSkies, PharaohDeli, , chibi heishi, I Dance The Tango, ScarlettKuasta, Niilan, XionItachi, Bokmal14, kuaispeed, Lachen, subaru1999, Schizo-of-Destiny, Kagimine, Thief Mistress Thorn, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, Ossa, Franklyn, Strange Liou, Lolchen, Miki55, Avenged Angel, RavenToriBlack, TwistedHero, Airyballoon, MidnightWraith and tyyyppi. You're all the environmentally-friendly fuel that keeps my writing-machine running smoothly :]**_

_**Also thank you to everyone who reassured me over my little alcohol slip-up :D (Woah...that sounded a lot more incriminating than it actually is.) And I'm so glad so many people were amused by Bakura's self-pwnage xD **_

_**Wow, chapter 12 got so many wonderful reviews :O Of course all reviews are LOVE, but when I get lots of long, in-depth ones I feel especially warm and fuzzy x3 **_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	14. Heaven Help Us

_**Chapter 14: Heaven Help Us**_

The rest of that evening was just one long nightmare.

In one way, it seemed as if Bakura's cruel mention of Ryou's sister had never happened, since Ryou simply went back to ignoring him as he usually did. However, at the same time there was definitely something much colder than usual in Ryou's expression, and a vastly steelier look in his eyes. He had a much more determined air about him as he took no notice of Bakura, as if he hoped that, by trying hard enough, he could actually make his yami cease to exist. The fresh memory of their latest clash hung heavily in the still, fluorescent-lit air of the kitchen, like a foul smell that couldn't be dispelled or an echo that refused to fade away. It was as if Bakura had stooped to a new low in that fight, and Ryou was _not going to forget it. _The temperature in the kitchen almost seemed to drop by a few degrees.

Needless to say, Bakura was somewhat relieved by the time Ryou's shift finally came to an end, though he was more than slightly apprehensive about the impending walk back to the teen's apartment. The two of them were silent as they got ready to leave, Bakura donning his usual long black coat and Ryou tugging on his spectacularly useless-looking grey jacket. They lingered a moment in the cloakroom, and Bakura slipped a hand into his right pocket to ensure his newly-sharpened knife was still safely enclosed within it. Not in a million years was he walking through these darkened streets without some form of weapon.

He suddenly realised Ryou's eyes were on him – or, more specifically, on his hand. As if he knew what he was doing. As if he were familiar with the motion.

"What?" Bakura snapped haughtily. It came out more defensive than he'd intended. He supposed he was still shaken from earlier.

"Armed and dangerous?" Ryou enquired pleasantly enough. That in itself was enough of a warning signal for Bakura to put his guard _right _up.

"What about it?" he growled, pulling the dagger out as if to prove he'd had no intention of trying to hide it, "Who would wander around this place _un_armed?"

Ryou gave a strange, blood-chilling little laugh.

"Not you. And not me," he replied blithely, extracting the single most hideous object Bakura had ever seen from his pocket with a smile, "Show me yours and I'll show you mine."

Bakura felt cold and sick. So sick. He wasn't sure what happened next – didn't even know he could move so fast. The next thing he heard was a cry of pain and shock from Ryou, and he realised with dim surprise that he'd slammed the teen against the nearest wall. He had a vice-like grip on his light's skinny right wrist – the wrist attached to the hand that still held _the knife_.

It wasn't like Bakura's own knife, which was ornate and deadly and designed for combat. It was a mere, plain kitchen knife, with a black plastic handle and a blade perhaps four inches long. But never mind its dull appearance, never mind that Ryou was holding it all wrong, it was a _knife, _it was sharp and it could kill people and what the _hell _was it doing in Ryou's pocket, in Ryou's hand?

"Have you ever used it?" Bakura found himself hissing. Ryou stared up at him, and for the first time since he'd got back from his three-year absence, Bakura could see genuine fear in his eyes. Fear of him. It should have made him feel powerful but it didn't.

"…No," Ryou answered him at length, trying to pull his wrist free but failing. Bakura scowled and tightened his grip until he was sure it was painful.

"Would you?" he snarled. Ryou pressed his lips tightly together, probably more to combat the pain than as an act of defiance, but it only served to fuel Bakura's fury, confusion, terror, devastation, whatever, _whatever. _He growled and dug his fingers mercilessly into the nerves in Ryou's wrist, at the same time pinning the teen's feet with his own to disable any struggle. All the colour instantly drained from Ryou's face and he stared helplessly at the source of the pain, small whimpers escaping his mouths despite his best efforts. Somehow, seeing him in distress only made Bakura feel worse but he couldn't stop because this was ridiculous, this wasn't _real, _Ryou didn't carry a fucking blade around with him now, that just _couldn't happen-!_

"Answer me!" he thundered, digging his bony fingers in harder, "Would you _ever_-?"

"Stop it!" Ryou shouted, eyes shut tight, grabbing at Bakura's arm with his free hand. He cried out when Bakura slammed his trapped hand against the wall with such force that it was surprising his knuckles didn't fracture. The yami repeated the agonising motion again and again until Ryou's hand went limp and he dropped the knife.

"Would you _ever use it?_" Bakura hissed darkly, face inches from his light's.

"_No!_" Ryou choked out, "No, I would never…I couldn't…"

Bakura glowered down at him heatedly, loosening but not relinquishing his hold on his wrist. Part of him was simply relieved to know that Ryou still didn't have it in him to take a blade to another living thing (_he_ could, of course, but that was different, Ryou wasn't supposed to be like him). But another part was just messed up and angry and he wanted to yell at his hikari, _If you won't use it, why even carry it? Why even think about it? You scared the shit out of me, you stupid __**brat-**__!_

His thoughts were interrupted by a strange sound, and by the way Ryou's skinny frame had started to tremble rather violently. He blinked and frowned, briefly wondering if he had succeeded, for the first time since the old days, in reducing the teen to tears. He wasn't entirely sure if this would be a victory for him or just another incident labelling him a monster, but it didn't matter because the very thought was stupid – there were no tears. Bakura knew with unwavering certainty that this Ryou – this strange, angry child he had helped create – would never cry, least of all in front of him. Crying in front of another person was like begging them for something – sympathy or mercy or forgiveness. Bakura was sure that Ryou would rather _die – _rather claw out his own eyes and present him with tears of blood – than show that weakness and ask such things of him.

He wasn't even sure if Ryou _could _cry these days. The teen seemed too distant, too cold, to be sufficiently affected by anything to weep over it. Not like the soft-hearted boy from years before, who cried so easily, out of fear or joy or sadness, and always for others before himself…

Bakura stared numbly at the teen before him now, who was not crying but _laughing, _and he wondered if that boy really was dead and buried.

He opened his mouth to demand just _what _about this situation his light found funny, but his voice seemed to have deserted him. Ryou's face was ghostly pale and his eyes, Bakura saw once the teen raised his head to look at him, danced with a dangerous cocktail of unidentifiable feelings. The laughter spilling from his lips was high-pitched and jittery but it _was _laughter – even more chilling that his usual 'laugh' despite, or perhaps because of, the fact that this held just a little bit of happiness in it. (Happiness? Or was it relief?) His smile was angular and fierce and looked as though it had been carved into his face.

"...Wow," he said finally, "Wow. Is this it…?"

"What are you talking about now?" Bakura snapped, trying to cover his disturbance.

"Hm. Even I never thought you'd beat me _this _easily…" Ryou went on, apparently trying to stifle his giddy laughter, "But I guess it doesn't matter. I always was unprepared at crucial moments, right?"

"What…?" Bakura started to ask, trailing off as his blood ran cold. He felt as if he'd taken a step out of his own body and was now looking at the two of them, and the current position they were in. Ryou was unarmed and as good as immobilised. And he still held his own knife in his free hand, instinctively poised as if to kill-

"I…No!" he snarled, lowering the knife so that it pointed towards the ground instead of in the general direction of his unprotected light.

"I don't mind if you do it, you know," Ryou said smilingly, his eyes following the blade and not noticing the stricken look on his yami's face, "Go ahead."

"I wouldn't kill you," Bakura growled, shoving the knife in his pocket as if to prove he wouldn't be using it tonight (or at least not on Ryou). He released the teen's wrist and took a few steps back. He suddenly didn't want to touch his light or even be too near him. Upon being freed Ryou immediately slid to the ground, cradling his abused hand and wrist. His smile had faded.

"Of course not…" he murmured.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Bakura demanded, unconsciously backing away a little more, "Why would you even think that, hikari?"

"Don't call me that," Ryou snapped mechanically, "You push me into a wall and point a knife at me. What am I meant to think? And how twisted are you, getting someone's hopes up like that…?"

"What the fuck are you _talking about_?" Bakura roared. Ryou chuckled softly.

"Come on," he said coolly, "Are you that stupid? Why do you think I always want to walk home alone when I know the type of people who roam these streets? Why do you think I leave my door unlocked some nights, or walk into traffic without looking, or yell at the junkies across the landing to shut up at three in the morning…?"

Of course, Bakura hadn't been aware of Ryou doing the latter three of those things, but that seemed to be beside the point.

"Don't you get it?" Ryou demanded, voice rising in volume, "If someone else kills me, it's not my fault, is it? It's not just me who's failed again! If it's an accident or even a murder, at least people won't shake their heads and say I just gave up…!"

"If you want to die, do it yourself," Bakura muttered, looking away. He didn't mean it. Of course he didn't. But he said it because he couldn't believe that Ryou really meant what he was saying either. It was ridiculous, it was absurd, almost as implausible as Ryou carrying a knife in his pocket…

But that was true, he realised with a feeling of cold dread.

"I can't. I'm not allowed to give up," Ryou said wretchedly, "But you…nothing's stopping you. You like pain, don't you? You can make it hurt as much as you like. But just do it. You can't come so close and then not do it. For God's sake, _do it_-!"

The teen fell silent with a startled cry when Bakura lashed out as if to backhand him across the face, though he stopped his arm before actually making contact. Ryou stared at the floor with wide eyes.

"Are you really so desperate to die?" the yami asked lowly, eyes narrowed.

"I'm not all that desperate to live," Ryou replied with a nervous titter, "I mean…why would I be…?"

"What, you think you've got nothing?" Bakura snarled, "You think this is as bad as it gets?"

Ryou paused and glanced up at him doubtfully, as if considering for the first time whether his sorry life could really be worse.

"You really are a brat," Bakura hissed dangerously, "So things are tough. You think that gives you the right to just give up-?"

"I told you, I'm not allowed to give up!" Ryou yelled.

"Letting someone else kill you is no better than killing yourself! It's still your choice, so it's still your fault!" Bakura thundered, "Why are you so pathetic? You really think you've got nothing? You've got a fucking future! Things might be shit now, but that doesn't mean everything just _stops_! You've still got a chance, you've got…"

"…What?" Ryou questioned when he didn't continue, "What have I got?"

"People who worry about you, even if you do just throw it back in their faces," Bakura growled, "Maybe not many, but even _one _should be enough, that should be more than enough, because…"

He trailed off. Because that was more than _he _had had.

He glared down at his hikari, hating him with a new intensity and, for the first time, with a solid reason. What did Ryou really know about having _nothing? _Had he seen his home burnt to the ground, and every single person he'd ever known rounded up and slaughtered? Had Ryou hid in pathetic, childish fear and looked on as his entire world was wiped out and reduced to nothing but ashes before his eyes? Did Ryou know what it was like to lie alone on the burning sand for days and days, staring at the sky with unseeing eyes and wishing every moment to die, just die, turn to ashes like the rest of them just so he wouldn't be alone anymore-?

He drew in a deep, sharp breath. Now wasn't the time to remember things like that. It would be too easy to blame them on Ryou.

"Get up," he ordered, grabbing Ryou by his forearms and hauling him to his feet, "You're not dying tonight, so you might as well walk home."

"Don't touch me," Ryou hissed, shoving his hands away before frowning at him with just a touch of curiosity, "...Before, you wouldn't let me die because...because I was your _host_," he spat the word from his lips with a look of pure revulsion, "But now, you don't need me. Why does it matter now...?"

"Yeah, I don't need your body now," Bakura said with a haughty shrug, "But that doesn't mean I want to _kill _you. Though you tempt me sometimes, I swear..."

"You've killed people before," Ryou said accusingly, "...Right?"

"Yes," Bakura said bluntly, "But not because they _asked _me to."

"So it's just something you do when the mood takes you?" Ryou questioned with a slight sneer.

"When needs be," Bakura said with a scowl, "Anyway. Killing _you _never even crossed my mind – until you became this infuriating, I mean. Before, when you were my dear landlord-" Ryou glared at him furiously, "-your death would have been my death. So I wouldn't let you die. Now...it's true, you're unneeded. So maybe I _would _let you die. But that's all."

"Ooh," Ryou said, frosty smile returning, "But isn't letting me die no better than just killing me? It's still your choice so it's still your fault..."

Bakura chuckled darkly.

"Not quite," he said with a smirk, "Killing you would mean I really wanted you to die. Letting you die means I just don't care whether you're dead or alive..."

To his surprise, Ryou just laughed.

"You're right," the teen said, "That does sound more like you."

He leaned down to retrieve his knife but Bakura snarled and kicked it across the floor.

"Leave it," he said warningly. Ryou scowled.

"I feel safer when..." he started.

"_Leave it_," Bakura repeated with a dangerous edge to his tone, "You don't need it anymore."

The walk back to Ryou's apartment was...tense. The two of them walked so far apart that no one looking would ever have guessed they even knew each other. Ryou had lapsed back into his customary stubborn silence, but Bakura wasn't particularly bothered by it – he was deep in thought (though he still kept one eye sharp for any suspicious figures lurking in shady alleyways, of course).

Now that his initial anger had simmered down somewhat, he grudgingly supposed that he shouldn't consider Ryou's situation with quite so much disdain. The teen's experiences hadn't been as horrific as his own, but...maybe the feelings weren't so different. Ryou still had a few people looking out for him, but he had no family (his presumably still-living father didn't count), no one there with him all the time, to talk with him and guide him through the final awkward years of his adolescence. It was hard to grow up without any adults around to show you exactly what it meant to _be _grown up.

Bakura twisted his mouth from side to side. He knew Ryou would loathe the very idea, but he probably understood the teen's circumstances and feelings better than anyone – better than Kazuma or Malik or the goddamned Pharaoh. He knew how the story went, didn't he? You were born and you grew, moulded by the people around you – parents, siblings, relatives, teachers, everyone. You defined yourself based around those people. You were a son, a brother, a friend, a pupil, and you think you know who you are and why you're there because you have an identity, a _purpose_, those people dedicate a little piece of their life to you, they need you-

But when those people disappear, who are you then...?

Bakura stole a sideways glance at his hikari. If he understood it so damn well, did that mean he was supposed to help? Was that why he was back in the world of the living – to stop Ryou from being dragged into the same darkness he had fallen into so willingly...?

They reached the dilapidated excuse for an apartment building. Ryou turned away and went to go inside without sparing his yami so much as a glance.

"Hey," Bakura called after him, "Enough of this dying thing."

"It's nothing to do with you," Ryou said absently, all that angry fire gone again, "Besides being your fault."

"Aso works pretty hard to keep you safe," Bakura reminded him, "And Malik wouldn't like it."

Ryou turned back to face him, fierce smile back in place.

"He wouldn't, would he?" he said, "That's exactly why I can't 'give up'. That's why it has to be an 'accident'..." he gave another small, chilling laugh, "Uh-oh, maybe I'll slip on the stairs on the way up to my apartment...? What a _silly _accident..."

Bakura looked at him suspiciously for a moment, gauging his seriousness.

"I guess I'm walking you to your fucking door, then," he said finally with a growl, also entering the dank building. Ryou blinked in surprise before raising an eyebrow.

"I thought you didn't care whether I live or die?" he questioned as they climbed the stairs. The air smelt strongly of damp and faintly of urine and other unspeakable things.

"Well, I guess that's not _entirely _true..." Bakura mused.

"What?" Ryou questioned, looking genuinely shocked. Bakura smirked.

"Don't forget," he said, wagging a finger, "I get paid to keep you alive these days."

"...Oh," Ryou said, eyes downcast, "Yeah."

When they safely reached Ryou's apartment without any 'accidents', Bakura halted him again just before he went inside.

"...Is your wrist ok?" he asked stiffly, looking away.

Ryou gave him a 'if looks could kill, you'd be pushing daisies' sort of glower before slamming the door pointedly in his face.

"I guess not..." Bakura muttered, turning away, "My bad."

* * *

"...Selye's research, which involved exposing rats to various noxious agents, led him to propose that living organisms will display identical physical symptoms in response to any stressor. He entitled this universal stress-response the General Adaptation Syndrome, or GAS, and theorised that it was...made up of...three...stages..."

Malik gave up and switched his very old-school tape recorder off as he continued to yawn. Physiological psychology wasn't his favourite sub-topic at the best of times, so when it was past one in the morning and he was struggling to just stay awake, he knew he should really stop kidding himself. He yawned again (surrendering to one always seemed to trigger another) and pushed his books to one side, wondering if there was something else (requiring less brain-power and concentration) that he could occupy himself with. His eyeballs itched with tiredness, but he wasn't quite ready to settle down and sleep yet.

He didn't even want to close his eyes.

He glanced uneasily around his familiar and wholly un-threatening apartment, in which he'd never once felt afraid before...

Before-

_Gods, you can't even say it, can't even think it, what the fuck is wrong with you...?_

He shuddered. It seemed ridiculous that he, the boy who had been raised in the dank blackness of an underground cavern, could be afraid of being alone at night. It wasn't even dark in the small flat – with every light switched on, like tonight and every night for the past few weeks, there was nowhere for shadows to hide. But he was powerless to illuminate the inky winter darkness outside, just beyond the windows. It seemed to press in on every side with crushing force – and drawing the curtains didn't make any difference because it was still _there, _still a solid presence, and Malik knew it was stupid to be scared of the dark but he couldn't help it because the darkness made him think of-

_Ok, ok , it makes me think of_ _**him**__, because __**he is the darkness **__and what better time to seek out his light than when he's was all alone and surrounded by the dark...? _

Malik grimaced, feeling more than a little disdainful of how pathetic he was being. He knew he was becoming increasingly paranoid as more time continued to pass without any sign of Mariku. By this stage, the slightest creak of a floorboard or the softest whisper of a draught was enough to send him into palpitations. He'd briefly wondered if his darkness had come back into the world in Egypt rather than here, but that didn't seem quite right. After all, Pharaoh and Bakura had both popped up within easy walking distance of their lighter halves...

He switched the TV on just to combat the heavy silence that had set in the moment he'd stopped chatting to his tape recorder. That was another thing he hated about night-time: it was just so damn quiet.

Despite himself, his mouth twitched upwards slightly at that. At least, it _was _quiet, until Bakura would come storming in, almost always spitting mad at something Ryou had done or said or not said. Then things would get quite lively, and he'd forget all about his fear.

Malik clapped a hand over his eyes with a groan. As ridiculous as it was for him to feel afraid in his own apartment, it was about a billion times more insane for him to feel comparatively secure thanks to the presence of a borderline-murderous, perpetually angry ex-tomb-robber.

He paused and peered thoughtfully through his fingers. Bakura was definitely better now than he'd been before, though. He certainly still wasn't eligible for the Nice Guy of the Year award, but...something was different. Especially compared to the unhinged, bloodthirsty persona of the spirit of the Millennium Ring. Now, it seemed like with the passing of each day, the Thief became just a little more...what?

_Human._

Malik blinked before snorting to himself. That was stupid. How could a person become 'more human'...?

He supposed he just couldn't think of the right word. But whatever was happening, it could only be an improvement. He wondered if Ryou had noticed...?

He snorted again. That seemed unlikely.

An uncomfortable sensation ran down his spine in response to that thought. A small voice in his head accused him of being treacherous. It kind of sounded like Otogi.

_Whose side are you on, anyway? _

He worried at his lower lip anxiously. Of course he'd set out to help Ryou. He'd simply thought that resolving the situation with Bakura would bring Ryou at least a few steps back in the direction of those who cared about him.

But any sort of resolution seemed far-off and improbable. And the deeper Malik trod into the pair's pain-filled non-relationship, the more he found himself actually wanting to help Bakura too. And in between thinking that Bakura really needed to learn to treat Ryou more gently, he also found himself wondering why _Ryou _couldn't just be a little bit more patient and understanding...

Maybe he was on neither side...?

Or maybe he was on both, a more hopeful voice in his head suggested.

In any case, he'd take Bakura over his own darkness any day. And, as of a short while ago, probably over Atemu too. Malik squirmed as he thought back over his past little while at the Kame Game Shop. It hadn't been fun. Nothing was ever _done _to him, as such – of course not. Atemu would never hurt him because Atemu was _reasonable _and Atemu was _Good –_ and clearly very fixed in his opinion that Malik was quite the opposite. Maybe he liked that superiority. _Someone _had to be the bad guy, right? And since Malik was still refusing to give away Bakura's location, he supposed that made him the next easiest target. (He was surprised that no one had yet paid him a home visit in order to conduct a full search, but surmised that they considered him far too cunning a villain to keep his accomplice in his own home. As much as he hated that reasoning, he guessed he should be grateful.)

So, no, he wasn't coming home from work with bruises and black eyes, the victim of name-calling or the recipient of malicious text messages. It was little things. Things that other people wouldn't notice. Like how whenever he was in a room with Atemu or Otogi or – God forbid – both, they would not speak, or do so as little as possible, from the moment he came in the door until the moment he left again. As if anything and everything they said in his presence was being stored away in some evil log-book in his mind for later mischief-making purposes.

And they watched him. Oh God, they watched him. He couldn't move or breathe or sneeze without plum and emerald eyes fixed on him, narrowed in suspicion and steely with hate and distrust. And he just couldn't _function _like that, couldn't act normal when he knew those cold eyes were on him like beams of ice that chilled him to his bones, and he couldn't help it, he panicked, he made mistakes, and then-

And then what? What did they do when he messed up and fumbled under their gaze? Shake their heads with scorn? Or did they laugh? Did they secretly enjoy his anxiety, and his _pathetic _desperation for approval, which they mistook for the only slightly more nauseating desire to ingratiate himself into the Inner Circle and infect it with his darkness-?

The colour rose in Malik's cheeks and the anger sparked in his eyes. Was he laughable to them? He knew they thought he was twisted and, of course, 'Bad', but did they also consider him to be stupid and awkward and snivelling – the worst kind of villain, whom you can't even fear or grudgingly respect because they're just so damn pitiful...?

He bit back the urge to scream out his rage and frustration. Those feelings built up in him more and more every time he had to go to work, and it was becoming increasingly hard for him to keep them buried. And he knew that couldn't mean anything good. He clenched his hands into painful fists, gladly letting his fingernails gouge burning half-moons into his palms, as if some of his dangerous anger could somehow filter harmlessly out of the wounds. It was never fair. He had never asked for Otogi or Atemu to like him or care for him or even respect him. He could have lived with their complete dismissal. But instead, they misunderstood him. Completely. Utterly. They had looked at past events and present circumstances and they thought they were simply being logical when they decided that the only possible conclusion was that it was Malik, the puppet-master, the King Rare Hunter, the light almost as dark as his darkness, it was all _Malik's _fault again-

_Bastards. 'Good' is not good! You bastards, **bastards-!**_

He started sharply when the phone rang. Its cool electronic trill seemed to call him back down to the real world; the normal world where there were no Pharaohs or destinies or light or dark. _Ring, ring. Come back, Malik. You're a regular old college student and your phone is ringing._

Shaking his head to clear it of any residual fury and that creeping madness, he got to his feet and crossed the room to the phone. Funny how other people's 'reality', the generally accepted norm, felt so dreamlike and artificial to him sometimes – he was like a character in a poor fantasy film, hauled from his magical realm where spirits lived in artefacts and fathers carved secrets into their sons' backs, and thrown into a shaky backdrop of everyday life, attending college like anyone else, doing his part-time job, shopping for books and groceries and...

And how could any of it be real...?

All these thoughts vanished like dust on the wind the moment his hand touched the smooth plastic casing of the phone. It was normal and safe and made sense and everything became three-dimensional again.

"Hello, Kame Game- shit!" he swore, almost laughed and then winced as he realised he had not only answered the phone in work-mode but had also shouted an obscenity at whoever was calling, "I mean, hello?"

To his intense relief, a familiar laugh rather than an indignant shout answered him.

"_That's an interesting way to answer the phone, Malik,"_ an amused and warm female voice commented.

"Isis?" he questioned, knowing it was. A small smile alighted his previously sombre face.

"_Hello to you, too."_

"Yeah, sorry about that..." he muttered before glancing at the clock and frowning, "Why are you calling me at this time...?"

"_This time?" _his sister repeated, sounding perplexed, _"I thought it was as good a time as any..."_

"You forgot about the time difference again, didn't you?" Malik said with a chuckle. He heard Isis give a mortified gasp, "Yeah, you did."

"_Oh, I'm so sorry, I'm just so used to you phoning me..."_ Isis moaned, "_What time is it over there...?"_

"Almost half one. In the morning."

"_What? Don't you have college tomorrow?"_

"Later today, actually..."

"_Why aren't you in bed?"_ Isis demanded, sisterly instincts rearing their ugly head.

"I was waiting for you to phone?" Malik tried with a snigger.

"_Very funny. Honestly, you shouldn't still be up at that time..."_

"Your phone-call would've woken me anyway!" he groaned, once again amazed at his sister's ability to delude herself that he was still eight years old, "So what's up, anyway?"

"_Nothing, really..." _Isis replied, _"I was just a little worried, since you're usually so good at keeping your 'one phone-call every two weeks' promise. Had you noticed that it's been over a month since Rishid or I heard from you...?"_

"Oh...sorry," Malik said, glad that his sister couldn't see his undoubtedly furtive expression. He had noticed. Obviously. But he'd also known that any phone-call he made to his siblings would only cause them unnecessary grief if he told them about the recent phenomenon of spirits returning from the dead (or the Shadow Realm, in his yami's case). Said phenomenon was going to be pretty difficult to avoid in conversation without flat-out lying.

"_Aren't you even going to give me an excuse?" _Isis enquired.

"I've been...distracted, I guess," Malik said absently, sitting back down on the sofa and switching the TV off, "Kind of busy."

"_College work?" _Isis asked just a little too lightly. Malik grimaced while also suppressing a yawn, suddenly realising that he currently lacked the energy and good humour for one of these 'conversations', since he was very much aware that they took place almost solely to assure his sister of his continuing sanity. And just to add to the fun, there would be the inevitable argument about his college course. He knew that, on Isis' personal lists of things she did not want her delicate, unstable brother to be studying, psychology probably ranked about third, right behind forensic science and business management.

"Yeah, they've been giving us a lot of assignments recently..." he replied vaguely, hoping that she would leave it but knowing it just wouldn't happen.

"What are they teaching you about?" she asked, still in that overly-conversational tone that sounded so fake.

"Psychology, shockingly," Malik said. He'd intended for it to sound joking but it came out somewhat snappish.

"_Malik..."_

"I'm tired, Isis," he said (which was true, in more ways than one), "What do you want me to tell you? That you were right all along and the course content is just too upsetting for me? Look, I already read ahead to the chapters on psychological disorders and it's _fine_-"

"_Malik, don't," _Isis said, voice suddenly slightly shrill.

"Why not? It's what you're worried about, so I'm just telling you," he said with frustration, "I mean, that was the main reason I chose to study this – to find out _why _people get messed up in the head and to prove that it does happen to other people and not just-"

"_Enough," _Isis interjected firmly, _"You know I'm only concerned for you."_

"And _that's _way more likely to make me go crazy than anything I learn in class," he informed her darkly.

"_You sound stressed, little brother."_

Malik sighed heavily, knowing that she was disregarding everything he said in his defence. Malik was fragile and delicate and would always need his big siblings to make sure he was still relatively normal. He couldn't escape. If it hadn't been for the terrible state he'd been in a few years ago, he doubted Isis would even have let him leave Egypt.

"You _don't _sound stressed. So I guess you haven't heard from Yuugi over the past few weeks either?" he suggested, grateful that he could at least change the subject, even if this subject was likely to send his sister into more of a panic than the possibility of studying psychology sending him into some kind of bizarre relapse.

"_No, the phone has been very quiet lately," _Isis confirmed, _"Why, has something happened...?"_

And so he told her. He wasn't quite sure how he forced the words out but he must have succeeded because he heard his sister's horrified gasp closely followed by a loud thump. He briefly wondered if she had fainted but then realised she had just dropped the phone.

"Isis? You ok...?" he asked apprehensively, at the same time hearing the slightly far-off voice of Rishid asking her what was wrong. A few trembling mutterings later and his adopted brother's cry of alarm sounded through the earpiece. Malik winced, realising a little too late that this hadn't been one of his finer ideas.

"_Malik?" _Rishid said, having apparently snatched up the phone. His deep voice, normally so resonant with calm and patience, was odd and strained.

"That's me..." Malik replied quietly. Beneath his dread at what was to come, he was glad that, even in a moment of stress such as this, Rishid's old habit of addressing him as 'master' still seemed to be safely stamped out, "How are you...?"

"_Is it true? That monster is back? With a body of his own?" _his brother demanded, ignoring the stupid question. Behind the dominant tones of panic and concern, there was another emotion that Malik couldn't quite identify – something that spoke of the older man's inability to live his own safe, normal life without Malik's magically-enhanced split personality screwing things up for everyone again.

"That seems to be the situation..." he confirmed awkwardly, incredibly glad that he didn't have to look at his siblings' faces right now. He didn't even want to think what their expressions looked like at this moment.

"_Has he hurt you?"_

"No."

"_Or anyone else?"_

"Not that I know of...I haven't actually seen him..."

"_What? Then...how do you know he's back...?"_

Malik decided very quickly that he was _not _going to tell his brother and sister about the lingering connection that still existed between him and his darkness.

"Pharaoh told me," he said instead (which wasn't a lie – only a partial truth), "He said that he saw him."

"_...Pharaoh?" _Rishid repeated, and Malik could hear the sting of unease in his voice so clearly that it almost hurt, _"He is back too...?"_

"...Yes," Malik replied simply, opting not to mention the additional return of Bakura since that could lead to some hellishly awkward questions that he wouldn't want to answer and it wasn't really relevant to the subject at hand anyway.

"_Good God, what is happening...? Demons return from the shadows and the dead walk the earth again...?" _Rishid muttered, perhaps mainly to himself, _"Don't worry, Malik, we'll be right there."_

This time, it was Malik who almost dropped the phone.

"Wait, you'll...you'll _what_?" he blurted out, fighting to keep his voice relatively calm.

"_We'll be on the first plane out of Egypt. You can't face that maniac on your own, little brother."_

And there it was again. _You can't do it on your own. You're helpless. You're fragile. Don't try and hide it because we've seen it, everyone has, you remember-_

Malik was silent for a long moment, feeling slightly overwhelmed by simultaneous feelings of irritation and relief and horror and need. If his siblings were here, he would feel coddled, patronised and powerless. But he would not feel afraid.

"...No," he said finally (quietly, regretfully, firmly), "No, don't come."

"_What? Please don't be stubborn, Malik, none of us wants a repeat of-"_

"There won't _be _a repeat of Battle City," Malik said almost sternly, "Please, just stay where you are."

It was harder than he'd expected not to just cave and agree for them come and let them sort everything out for him again, like a whiny little kid getting his big brother and sister to beat up the playground bully. He resented the fact that he did indeed wish they would come, hated himself for it, but he couldn't deny it. However, he also knew that they _couldn't _come. Their 'faith' in him was delicate enough already – he had a nasty feeling that they, like Atemu and Otogi, would turn cold if they found out that he was assisting Bakura. And if they found out that the Thief was _living _with him...it didn't even bear thinking about.

He could hear his brother and sister talking to each other, mostly likely discussing his request with great dubiety and some suspicion, and then Isis reclaimed the phone.

"_Malik, why do you want us to stay away?" _she asked him, her voice slightly shaky but calm again.

"...I don't want to trouble you with all this again-"

(And oh how he wished that was true, that that was the only reason, he would love to be so honourable and selfless...)

"_Don't be ridiculous, it's not 'troubling us'! We're a **family, **Malik-!"_

"No, hear me out," he pressed on, shutting his eyes tightly and forcing himself to continue on the right side of this debate as much as he wanted to give in, "You two shouldn't have to come and bail me out every time something bad happens. And I know this isn't your average bad thing but...I can deal with it. I should have told you about it earlier, it was stupid to keep it from you this long. But I'll be fine, honestly. You don't need to come."

"_...But..."_

He could feel more than hear his sister trying to summon an argument even as the possibility of not having to get involved dangled tantalisingly in front of her. If Rishid could hear the conversation, he was probably going through a similar series of emotions. Malik knew his siblings loved him – he wasn't insecure enough to doubt that for even one second, though he did often maintain that he didn't deserve it. So he knew that if he asked them – if he even _hinted _that he needed them – they would be by his side as fast as was humanely possible. But he also knew that they had lives of their own, and that they had had more than enough pain and stress from him to last them until eternity. They wanted peace and quiet and normality, and he was offering it to them. And yet they still seemed indecisive. He supposed they, rather like him, couldn't think of a good, selfless enough reason for what they really wanted. Taking a deep breath, he delivered one last reassuring remark, which he knew would be the final nail in his self-built coffin.

"And remember, Pharaoh is here too. I'm not alone."

Isis' internal sigh of relief was almost audible.

"_You're right, I forgot..." _she said, and Malik could hear the smile in her voice, _"Of course, Pharaoh will take care of you."_

Malik pulled a face, feeling as though he had just force-fed himself a beaker of acid.

"Yeah, I'm sure he will..." he murmured with as much conviction as he could muster. It wasn't a lot, but it seemed his sister was too preoccupied with offering silent thanks to the Pharaoh for always being there to get her little brother out of a bind to notice. If she only knew.

"...I should be getting to sleep now," Malik said after a short silence (having absolutely no intention of doing so).

"_Promise me you'll be careful," _Isis implored him gently.

"Of course. Don't worry."

"_We will worry. But I can rest just that much easier, knowing the the Pharaoh will be watching over you."_

"...Bye, Isis."

"_Goodnight, little brother-"_

Malik hung up before she could elaborate further on just how wonderful the Pharaoh was, because he didn't think he could stomach it. He didn't hate Atemu, the way Atemu seemed to hate him. (Or maybe that was harsh, maybe the Pharaoh just disliked him, distrusted him, but didn't _hate_ him, hate was for villains and creatures of darkness-) In fact, he didn't even _blame _Atemu for what he was doing to him. (Or not doing, or whatever.) But he couldn't bring himself to like him. Not right now.

He jumped (as he always did) when he heard the front door open. Turning quickly with the now-customary feeling of rising dread, he relaxed when he saw it was, as always, just Bakura.

"Oh, hey," he said, "Good timing."

Bakura looked at him blankly.

"What?" he asked with a frown.

"I was just about to give up waiting and go to bed, I mean," Malik said with a grin, inwardly slightly appalled at how blithely he could lie through his teeth. _Don't mention Bakura to Isis. Don't mention Isis' phone-call to Bakura. Come on, it's not __**lying, **__not really-_

"No one _asked _you to wait for me..." Bakura muttered acidly, but Malik put it down to his apparent ill temper. After all, he'd seen the kind of hideous mood the Thief would end up in the morning after if he _wasn't _there to talk to him when he got home.

"How was Ryou tonight?" Malik asked, ignoring the comment.

"Uh...axe-shit insane?" Bakura said dully, flopping onto the sofa next to him.

"Right," Malik snorted, shaking his head dismissively, "You always say that."

"And you never believe me..." Bakura grouched, turning away.

"That's because it's stupid," Malik said frankly, rolling his eyes. Bakura shot him a scathing glare that seemed loaded with deadly promise: _One day I'm going to drag you along with me to that place, and __**then **__you'll see, then you'll believe me when I tell you how fucking __**scary **__he can be-_

"Anyway, I meant how was he in terms of his general well-being," Malik said shortly, swiftly rattling the conversation along, "You know I hardly see him."

Another look, less of a glare this time, more of a quick, almost pitying glance. _Yeah, I know you don't. That's why you don't know a __**thing.**_

Malik really wished he could stop over-analysing everything.

"Why do you always ask questions you don't really want the answer to?" Bakura demanded testily, "Do you think I'll tell you he looks healthy? He's too skinny and he looks like he never sleeps. He's working himself to death and he doesn't even give a shit. If his hair wasn't already white, it'd be going grey."

"Nothing new, then..." Malik said with a sigh, "Still. At least you _notice _those things."

"What difference does _that _make?" Bakura snapped.

"None, really, it just shows you at least pay attention," Malik said blandly. The Thief was clearly in a particularly tetchy mood tonight, and he really wasn't up to dealing with it, "What happened with you guys to put you in such a bad temper?"

"I'm not in a bad temper," Bakura retorted almost sulkily.

"You're always in a bad temper."

"It was just...the same as always, except worse," Bakura ground out, throwing up his hands, "I said some shit I shouldn't have and he..."

He trailed off. Malik raised an eyebrow at him expectantly.

"He got angry," Bakura concluded dully.

"You know, I might be pointing out the horribly obvious here but maybe you should just think before you open your mouth," Malik said, shaking his head, "I mean, if you're just going to regret it afterwards."

"I never said I _regretted _it," Bakura hissed.

"But you do."

"Shut up."

"Seriously, Bakura..." Malik groaned, rubbing at his eyes sleepily, "If you make the same mistake over and over again, you never get anywhere...that's just the same as never learning at all..."

"Give me a break," Bakura snapped, "You don't know how _impossible _he is..."

"Impossible for what? What are you trying to do?" Malik asked exasperatedly. God, he was tired.

"How many times do I have to tell you I don't know?" Bakura growled, folding his arms, "I can't stand him. But after everything...wouldn't it just be _strange _if I was here, in this world, and had nothing to do with him? I don't know, it just seems...it would be stupid, somehow..."

Malik looked at him for a long, long moment. He couldn't help but feel pity for the Thief at times like this – his emotional spectrum was such a _wreck, _he didn't even know what he wanted or why. Didn't even realise that some part of him _did _want to help Ryou, and fix the thing that had been so badly broken.

"I don't get you," he said at length, stifling a yawn, "If you feel like you two aren't _meant _to be apart or be against each other, I guess that means you think there is some kind of 'connection' there. Something that goes beyond host and parasite. But if you think that, then why did you treat Ryou so badly when you were in the Ring...?"

"Because he was nothing," Bakura said, as if this should have been glaringly apparent, "He was just the landlord."

Malik was about to ask 'so what's changed?' but stopped himself. After all, there was very little that _hadn't _changed.

"You were still in the Ring when Ryou lost his family, right?" he said instead, "I thought, at the very least, you'd be able to empathise with that."

"Why? Were the situations really so _similar_?" Bakura sneered. Malik simply looked at him until the sneer fell away and he grudgingly continued, "Alright, I suppose I can..._empathise _a little now. I guess we both felt the same kind of pain."

"But back then, why couldn't you understand him?" Malik persisted, "Why didn't you give a damn when it happened?"

"Uh," Bakura looked at him blankly, "Because of Zorc, most likely."

Malik's expression became equally blank.

"Because of who?" he questioned pensively, nonplussed by the seeming non sequitur.

"Zorc," Bakura repeated, "You know, the demon. I brought him out of the Millennium Tablet in the Memory World. And yet I still lost..."

"What's Zorc got to do with the Ring and you and Ryou and...?" Malik asked, looking utterly at sea.

"_Because _when I was in the Ring, me and Zorc were sort of...the same..." Bakura trailed off when Malik's face remained mystified and alarmed, "You didn't know any of this, did you?"

"Know _what_?" Malik said in a slightly high-pitched voice, looking extremely apprehensive, "Explain _now._"

The blonde teen looked just stressed enough to be almost intimidating, and Bakura apparently decided the best plan of action to avoid some kind of fit would be to obey.

"After...Kul Elna," he started hastily, shoving past the unpleasant memories to get the explanation out, "Zorc...we kind of made a deal. He'd help me get my revenge and collect all the items that were born out of my village's death, if I used them to resurrect him-"

"He _helped _you?" Malik questioned, one sandy eyebrow raised in the perfect image of suspicion.

"...Yes. Our souls split. Sort of...merged. We were...the same..."

Bakura stopped talking and shut his mouth when he caught sight of the look on Malik's face. He'd only seen that look a few times before, and he knew it didn't mean anything particularly good. True to form, mere seconds later the Egyptian teen lunged forward and grabbed him by the front of his shirt. Despite his premonition that he was in trouble, Bakura was so stunned by the action that he could only blink.

"And you didn't tell me this before..._because?_" Malik almost hissed, shaking him furiously to punctuate the apparently pertinent question. Bakura scowled and attempted to dislodge the blonde's tight-fisted hands, but he was quickly learning that Malik was a lot stronger than he looked.

"I thought you would have known that," he snapped, "Didn't you notice that I was kind of _different _back then...?"

"Of course I _noticed_!" Malik all but screeched, "Gods, you could have made this so much simpler for me! Things kind of make _sense _now-!"

"Really?" Bakura said with another blink. In his opinion, none of it made much sense.

"_Yes, _it..." Malik trailed off and finally let go of his shirt. Bakura looked down huffily at the stretched material, "Wait, does Ryou know this?"

"If you didn't know..." Bakura said, eyes still on his dishevelled shirt, "Then probably not."

"Jesus..." Malik groaned, "And you never thought to tell him? Don't you think he might forgive you a _little _if he knew-?"

"I'm not about to start making _excuses_," Bakura sneered, finally looking him in the eye again, "Zorc was only a part of it. I was still...I mean..."

"I know you were, and are, still a bastard," Malik said with all the subtlety of a herd of elephants, "But...come on, you were part of a goddamn _demon_-!"

"I know!" Bakura growled, "But I still don't see any point in telling _him _about it. It wouldn't do any good. I don't think he'd believe it, and even if he did...You said it yourself, Malik. He lives off his hate just now. If that was taken away..."

There was a pause.

"...Are you just going to let him keep punishing you?" Malik asked finally, cautiously, tilting his head to one side.

Bakura didn't answer him for a moment. Malik hadn't been at Angels' Lot that night, and so Malik could never have guessed what the white-haired yami was thinking about in that moment: Ryou's frayed and splintered state of mind, the near-emptiness of his life and, above all, his hideous willingness to die.

"Until he finds something better to hold onto," Bakura said slowly, "I think that would be best."

"Best for him?" Malik asked without accusation, "Or for you?"

Bakura folded his arms and turned away.

"For both of us, I guess."

* * *

_**Ok, I think it's done...? Maybe?**_

_**Long chapter is long D:**_

_**Sooo it should be relatively clear to everyone now that, just because Malik has calmed down a lot, that doesn't mean he's not still a little bit crazy :P For me, a one hundred percent sane Malik would be unrealistic and horribly boring.**_

_**Oh. Someone asked me in a review if I'd read a book called 'The Wish List'. Unfortunately...it was an anonymous review, leaving me unable to reply. (I'm looking at you, Franklyn :P) Anyway. No, I haven't read that book. Does it seem like I've been stealing parts from it or something? D:**_

_**Big deep-fried and chocolate-covered thank you's go out to pride1289, AnimeLoverAngel, Voltrix Zee Horo, koji3, Bluejay4905, chibi heishi, Bokmal14, tyyyppi, Strange Liou, hiddencry, Ceilo, stevenlover101, Airyballoon, PurpleRanchDressing0987, felton0fanatic, I Dance The Tango, AliceCambio, subaru1999, Tenshi no Toki, Franklyn, , Schizo-of-Destiny, ParadoxalPansy, NW, Moth Gypsy, Kagimine, Adlam-Yang, Atomic Lightbulb, .SaNiiTee, Yukirimi, KATZUNITED-MEOW- and BloodyPoisonKiss. I love you all more than ice cream :] And I feel bad because I've been neglecting my review-reply duties...this chapter, I swear D: I've just been sooo crazy-busy.**_

**_Hope you all have a good Christmas :) I doubt you'll be hearing from me again before then...xD_**

**_Note: Story rating has been changed to T mainly because most M-stories are thus rated due to the presence of one or more lemons. As I'm sure you've all noticed, there has been no mention of citrus fruit of any kind in this story so far. It was mainly rated for the bad language and the fact that Ryou works in a sleazy club. But I felt like it was giving people the wrong idea. Of course, if citrus fruits ever do come into the equation, the rating will go back up. Ok I'm done._**

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	15. Falling Flat

_**Chapter 15: Falling Flat**_

It was a slow, quiet sort of day at the Game Shop. Atemu was more than a little bored.

Weekday mornings and early afternoons were often like this; kids were in school and their obliging parents were at work, and so there weren't many people looking to buy games. The odd bored college student, senior citizen (generally acquaintances of Sugoroku's) or truanting high schooler wandered in from time to time, but that was about it.

Atemu checked the clock for what felt like the thousandth time that hour. He had a phone-call to make, and his determination to go through with the idea (coupled with the crippling tedium of working in a practically empty shop) was making him impatient. It was just past eleven. Probably still a bit early.

He sighed heavily and leaned one elbow on the cash desk, cradling his face in his hand. Yuugi was at college until midday, which was both a good and bad thing. On the one hand, Atemu was rarely bored when his light was around – they could talk about anything and entertained each other thoroughly. On the other hand, however, he had chosen this day to make his phone-call specifically _because_ Yuugi wasn't here. Not that he had anything to _hide _from his light, but...he just got the feeling Yuugi would disapprove. And they'd really had too many disagreements over the past few weeks. It wasn't like them at all. Atemu blamed certain darkish influences.

A scuffing noise to his left caught his attention and he turned his head languidly to see one such darkish influence emerging from the stock-room. Malik had a pricing gun in one hand and was dragging a large cardboard box behind him – presumably he was still unpacking stock from the latest delivery. He didn't look at Atemu as he passed. His head was lowered and his eyes downcast, as they always seemed to be. Sometimes Atemu thought he remembered Malik having his head and eyes up a lot more often for the first few days following his return to the world, but he brushed the consideration aside. Of course Malik would keep his eyes on the ground. Eyes were strange things. People could read things in them.

Atemu supposed that one advantage of the shop being this quiet was that it made it easier for him to keep a watch over the young Egyptian. He doubted that even Malik could wreak much havoc within the Game Shop (it was not a terribly conducive environment for evil) but it never hurt to be cautious.

Sugoroku also emerged from the back-shop a moment later, carrying his usual broom. He proceeded to start sweeping the floor near the front of the shop – which had already been swept and mopped that very morning and really didn't require any further attention. But Atemu had most definitely noticed, particularly over the past week or two, that Sugoroku seemed _very _reluctant to leave Malik alone in any part of the shop with either him or Otogi.

_What a spell you've woven here, tomb-keeper, _Atemu thought with another sigh.

He tore his gaze away from the silent Egyptian teen when he heard the tinkling of the bell at the front door. A small gaggle of schoolgirls (who were either sneakily taking advantage of a free period or blatantly playing hooky) shuffled inside, crowded closely together and glancing around uncertainly, as if very unsure of their surroundings. Atemu raised an eyebrow. They certainly didn't look like gamers of any description.

"Good morning, ladies," Sugoroku said cheerfully, offering them a smile of welcome, "Can I help you with anything?"

"Oh..." the girl closest to him started. She returned the smile, but the look of disappointment on every girl's face was unmistakeable, "Um, yes...I'm looking for this game for my brother..."

She pulled a piece of paper out of her blazer pocket and showed it to the ageing man. Suguroku, whose smile had become quite knowing, looked at it briefly and nodded.

"Yes, I believe we have that one..." he told her before turning around, "Malik, would you mind helping these young ladies find what they need?"

Malik, who appeared to have slipped furtively behind a shelf almost immediately after the girls entered the shop, stepped forward reluctantly and nodded. (The girls' crestfallen expressions vanished immediately.) Malik shot Sugoroku a slightly accusing look but otherwise kept his gaze on the ground and his expression indifferent. Sugoroku gave him the name of the desired game and the blonde teen went to retrieve it, the girls right behind him with bright excitement in their eyes and small giggles escaping their mouths.

Atemu rolled his eyes. Yuugi really hadn't been joking when he'd said the shop had many more female customers these days. Otogi alone would have been bait enough for young girls like these, but adding Malik into the mix just made it look _deliberate. _After all, those poor, silly girls had no way of knowing what lay beneath that bleach-blonde hair and sun-bronzed skin.

"Poor boy..." Sugoroku chuckled, going back to his unnecessary sweeping, "What a torment it must be."

"Yes..." Atemu replied plaintively.

The trilling of the bell signalled the door opening again, and a moment later Otogi stepped into the shop. Sugoroku nodded to him and Atemu raised a hand in greeting before waving the black-haired teen over. Otogi's shift didn't officially start until eleven thirty, but Atemu was beyond bored and beyond impatient.

"Would you mind watching the desk for a few minutes?" he asked quietly, "I have to make a phone-call."

"Sure," Otogi said with a shrug, "Our resident Rare Hunter here?"

"Yes, he's about somewhere..." Atemu said with a vague sweep of his hand, "Thanks, I'll be right back."

He slipped through to the back of the shop and into the small staff room, where there was a wall-mounted phone next to the fridge. There was, of course, a phone at the front desk, but that wasn't much good if you didn't want the whole shop to hear your conversation. Atemu took the phone down and reached into his pocket for the piece of paper Ryou had written his phone number on a few weeks ago. Yuugi had kept it but hadn't seemed awfully intent on using in the near future, so Atemu supposed he wouldn't notice if he borrowed it for a little while. He dialled the number carefully (he was getting there with modern technology, though he was still nowhere near as confident with it as a genuine child of the twenty-first century) and stood absently tapping his fingers against the nearby worktop as the phone started to ring.

Since he knew Ryou worked nights (_at a club, _he tried not to remind himself), he'd hoped to phone a little later in the day and so not disturb his presumably odd sleeping pattern. However, it couldn't be helped. He couldn't risk Yuugi coming back and finding out about this. He hated to hear Yuugi say that it was useless, that he couldn't help-

"_Hello?"_

He started out of his thoughts as a familiar voice suddenly came through the earpiece.

"Ryou," he said, relieved that he'd managed to get the number right, "Sorry, I hope I didn't wake you..."

"_Uh...no," _Ryou replied, sounding perplexed by the very idea that he'd still be sleeping at this time, _"Is that you, Pharaoh?"_

"Oh, yes. Sorry," Atemu said again.

"_Something I can help you with?" _Ryou asked with a distinct coolness to his tone.

"Yes. Well...sort of..." Atemu said falteringly, suddenly unsure of how to voice his request.

"_You're not still looking for __**him, **__are you?" _Ryou said irritably,_ "Don't think I'm going to help you two get together for another handbags-at-dawn encounter..."_

It took Atemu a few seconds to work out that by 'he', Ryou meant Bakura.

"As much as I would like to know Bakura's whereabouts, that's not why I called," he said hastily.

"_Oh. I'm out of guesses then. What is it?"_

"...I wondered if we could meet somewhere. Alone," Atemu said hesitantly. He heard Ryou snort.

"_That sounds very furtive," _he commented, _"I guess Yuugi doesn't know you're calling...?"_

"Well...no."

"_I see," _Ryou said with a kind of hideous understanding. Atemu got a sudden horrible feeling like his light had just been judged very harshly and yet not unfairly, _"But what do you need to see me for...?"_

"There are some things I'd like to discuss with you..." Atemu said lamely, wondering why he felt so nervous all of a sudden.

"_Such as...?"_

Atemu cleared his throat and steadied himself.

"I want to know what happened here while I was gone. The others are holding some things back. I want to know what happened to _you_..." he paused a moment, "I want to _help _you."

Ryou snorted quietly.

"_I really should have guessed that, I suppose..." _he said blandly.

"Ryou, please, I-"

"_There's a café right next to the park. Right outside the __**bad **__entrance. Meet me there at one o'clock and we'll get this stupidity over and done with."_

Atemu blinked when Ryou hung up without another word. He felt like the conversation hadn't gone particularly well, but still supposed he should consider it a victory since he had eventually got what he wanted.

He returned to the front of the shop, almost bumping into Otogi just outside the stock-room door. The black-haired teen smirked slightly and jerked his head in the direction of the cash desk. Malik was trying to get a large game box into a plastic bag, all the while keeping his head down even as one of the girls chatted brightly to him about something.

"He sure does a good job of acting as if he doesn't like the attention..." Otogi remarked, shaking his head.

Atemu nodded grimly.

* * *

A few hours later, on an extended lunch-break which Sugoroku had willingly but dubiously granted, Atemu was struggling to find the cafe Ryou had been referring to. After wandering around the park aimlessly for a short while, he stopped to ask an old woman feeding the birds if she knew where he might find one. To his surprise, she used to the same term Ryou had earlier: _I know there's one by the bad entrance, dear, but I don't know if you'd really want to go there...?_

It took him a while, but he finally managed to work it out. The park had two entrances: one coming from the north and one from the south. The good entrance and the bad one.

Shaking his head, he asked the woman for directions and, despite her concerned warnings about 'that side of town', he started to quickly make his way over.

When he finally found the small cafe, Ryou was already inside waiting. He could see him through one of the scratched, warped windows – the type not made from real glass. Ryou didn't appear to have noticed his presence until he entered the little building and approached him from behind, at which point the teen nearly gave him a heart attack by remarking, without once turning around, "You're late."

"Sorry...I got a little lost..." Atemu mumbled, taking the seat opposite him and trying to gather his composure. Ryou snorted. His hands were curled around a steaming polystyrene cup, probably more for the warmth this offered than for the actual beverage. The cafe's interior was almost as cold as the world outside. Ryou looked pale, thin and even more tired than Atemu remembered, but he wasn't sure if this was simply the norm now and so decided not to comment on it.

"...So?" Ryou said expectantly after a moment of silence, "You should probably start talking."

"Oh..." Atemu started, suddenly unsure of how to start. However, he could see very clearly that, if he wanted to get anywhere with Ryou, he'd have to at least act like he knew exactly what he was doing. The teen gave the impression of being able to smell fear, "Alright. Since I got back, a lot of things still haven't been explained to me."

"Maybe because those things have nothing to do with you?" Ryou suggested, without spite. He sounded almost pitying.

"But I think they do," Atemu insisted, "Honestly, Ryou, why do you consider yourself so far removed from me, and the others?"

"Because I live in a different world from them, and from you," Ryou said tiredly, "I think it's called reality."

Atemu frowned, perplexed. Ryou sighed.

"If you told Yuugi that the rug could be pulled out from under him at any time...that he could suddenly find himself all alone...he probably wouldn't believe you," he explained with a shrug. There was still no malice in his voice; only grim honesty, "But that's life. Yuugi and the others...they all have too much faith in this world. They think it wouldn't ever hurt them. But that's just stupid."

"They shouldn't have to live in fear," Atemu pointed out.

"A little awareness couldn't hurt," Ryou replied quietly.

"I think you're being a little hard on them..." Atemu said uncomfortably, looking at the tabletop.

"Really?" Ryou said distantly, "Then why are you here all alone? Why doesn't Yuugi know you talked to me on the phone?"

Atemu faltered, frowning again and looking up at him questioningly.

"You've noticed, haven't you?" Ryou pushed, "They don't want to know. I'm proof that nothing is safe, and everything can go wrong. Why would they want to look at something like that?"

"No," Atemu said immediately, though he felt no conviction behind the word, "You're mistaken, Ryou, they wouldn't..."

"Don't think that I hate them for it," Ryou said quickly, "I don't. I stopped hating them a long time ago. I feel kind of sorry for them sometimes. And I worry. Because if something bad _does _happen to one of them, I don't think they could take it..."

"They're stronger than you think," Atemu said steadfastly, determined to remember where his true loyalties lay.

"...Maybe you're right," Ryou said with a small shrug, "It's not like I know much about them after all this time. But I do know that I scare them. My existence scares them and it doesn't belong in their world. Don't tell me that's wrong."

Atemu tried to muster an argument but in the end just gave up and decided to bring the conversation back into its original vein.

"Regardless," he said steadily, "I want to know what they aren't telling me."

"What makes you think I want you to know?" Ryou said, sounding almost amused, "It's my life, isn't it? Honestly, you can be so arrogant without even meaning to..."

"Why is it arrogant to want to help a friend?" Atemu demanded, "And I don't think I _can _help unless I know-"

"Pharaoh," Ryou said with the sort of patience people normally reserved for squawking children, "We are not friends. We never were. If you want to 'help' me, it's only because there's no one better for you to save any more. Have you even thought this through? What is this 'help' you keep going on about?"

"I...I don't know," Atemu admitted grudgingly, "But it can't go on like this, with you in that place and that club and...and of course there's Bakura to think about..."

For the first time, Ryou laughed. Atemu didn't know it, but his response to the sound was almost exactly the same as Bakura's. He cringed.

"Him? You plan to 'protect' me from him?" the boy questioned, clearly entertained by the notion, "He knows where I live, and where I work. Don't pretend you didn't get that much out of Malik."

Atemu suddenly felt very cold – even compared to the general temperature of the cafe. Ryou nodded.

"Exactly. So where have you been for the past few weeks? Admit it, Pharaoh. You just got bored."

"It's not like that..." Atemu muttered.

"Alright," Ryou said with a shrug, "It was very...gracious of you to make the effort, but that'll do for now. You can always tell them that you tried and I threw it back in your face. They won't think any less of you. Except maybe Malik. But Malik's different."

"...Malik?" Atemu repeated suspiciously. The closest thing he had seen to a genuine smile flitted across Ryou's face.

"Malik lives in reality too," he said simply, "Poor thing."

"Are you and he...close?" Atemu asked apprehensively.

"He was the only one who knew where I worked until that little fiasco last month," Ryou replied with a shrug, "What do you think?"

"But why?" Atemu said in disbelief, "Out of everyone, why Malik?"

"Like I said," Ryou said vaguely, "He lives in reality too. We both know how ugly this world is..." he paused and then frowned challengingly at Atemu, "And also, for reasons that are none of your business, he's my friend. I think I confuse him sometimes, and I know I upset him quite a lot, but I don't scare him. I couldn't if I tried. He always looks straight at me. That's...precious, I guess..."

"He was the one who told Bakura where you work," Atemu pointed out stonily.

"I know. And I was really mad at him, at the time..." Ryou said, "But Malik's a really special kind of stupid. He lived so long in the dark that now he wants to find the 'light' in everything. He thinks everyone can change and get better, like he did...He was only trying to help."

"'Like he did'?" Atemu repeated, narrowing his eyes, "Bakura is a monster, Ryou. You of all people should know that. Malik is helping him..._hiding him. _How can you _possibly_-?"

He was cut off as Ryou abruptly got to his feet, brown eyes hard and cold.

"Don't you dare," the teen said frostily, "Ugh, I see. You've been blaming him, haven't you? You're bored and you need someone to save or a villain to fight. I won't let you help and Malik won't hand Bakura over to you, so you...God. You think you're so great, but you're a _bad _kind of stupid."

"Ryou, you're not listening," Atemu said, gritting his teeth to stop himself losing his temper with the angry boy, "When Malik told Bakura where you work, that wasn't the only time they spoke. Malik knows where he is, I think he's with him a lot..."

"I _know, _you idiot!" Ryou hissed, "I know exactly what Malik is doing. And I know where Bakura is, too. I see him almost every day, whether I want to or not, I know where he goes when he finally leaves me alone, I know where he sleeps at night. _But_ I won't tell you either. Because _it's nothing to do with you! _What could you possibly want with him? He'll just mess up your nice new life. But the fact that he clearly hasn't bothered looking for you shows that even _he _is less of an idiot than you. I'll bet he still hates you, but there's nothing left for you two to fight over. Just let it _go._"

Atemu stared up at him silently, struck speechless for the first time in a long time. Ryou exhaled angrily, shouldering his bag and shaking his head.

"And here I was trying to be civil...but you make me so _mad,_" he muttered before fixing Atemu with one more piercing glare, "If you hurt Malik, I won't forgive you."

And just like that, he was gone. He hadn't drunk a drop of his tea.

* * *

Meanwhile, the much-debated King of Thieves was sitting bored in Malik's apartment. The days felt so long when Malik was out and he had nothing to do. He had done some thieving earlier (and some actual shopping with the money he'd earned from the Lot – but shopping just wasn't the same) and had acquired (one way or another) a few new interesting things, including a small, black and thoroughly modern cell phone. He'd come to realise that pretty much everyone in the rich parts of today's world had one, and it wasn't as if he'd allow himself to be left behind. He could not, however, figure out how to operate it for the life of him. After half an hour or so he'd given up for fear of breaking the stupid device, deciding to swallow his pride and ask Malik for a tutorial later. It was getting easier and easier to do that, actually. Before, asking for help was just too great a humiliation to endure. But he'd started to find that it wasn't so bad when it was Malik.

The only downside was that it was getting to a point now where he was starting to feel like he owed Malik something in return. He growled lowly to himself. The Thief King shouldn't live in anyone's debt. And yet he turned to Malik time after time for explanations, advice and occasionally even _conversation. _Not to mention a place to sleep at night. And the food...that was a weird one. He still couldn't work out why Malik seemed happy enough to make food for both of them.

"That must cost..." Bakura mumbled to the empty room.

Since thieving was infinitely more entertaining than buying, he hadn't actually spent very much of his wages over the past few weeks. Frowning in contemplation, he split the pile of notes in half now. One of Malik's jackets was hanging on the coat hooks just inside the front door. Feeling like a royal moron, Bakura slipped half of the money into one of the pockets.

"It's a start..." he muttered, trying to ignore the way his face was burning at how totally uncharacteristic that action had been.

Well, maybe not? He glanced around the small apartment, a smirk creeping across his face. After all, Malik was the Landlord now, right? And Bakura always paid his rent.

Satisfied with this explanation, he sat back down on the sofa and decided to have another go at working the stupid phone.

* * *

Atemu arrived back at the Game Shop feeling dazed and more defeated than he'd care to admit. Stepping inside, he found the shop to still be as empty as it had been when he'd left. At first he couldn't see anyone at all, but just then the phone at the front desk started to ring and he jumped slightly when two figures came running out from nowhere to answer it. The two figures in question turned out to be Yuugi, evidently finished with college for the day, and Malik. They were both laughing as they raced for the phone, though Yuugi got there first. He grinned triumphantly as he snatched up the handset, and Malik rolled his eyes and stuck his tongue out in response.

"Good afternoon, Kame Game Shop..." Yuugi said, still smiling and slightly out of breath. Malik was still smiling too, until he caught sight of Atemu in the doorway. In that moment, the colour seemed to drain from his entire being, and his smile vanished. He tried to resurrect it but it just looked fake. In the end his head went down and his eyes dulled, like always.

Atemu narrowed his eyes and walked past him without a word.

* * *

Ryou went straight from the park to the nearest supermarket to do some grocery shopping, since he'd woken up that morning to find that he had quite literally no food in his fridge apart from a few carrots that had seen better days. He was still fuming by the time he'd bought all he needed (or could afford) and started the walk home. He'd _really _had just about enough of bloody spirits barging in and trying to interfere with his life-

Speaking of interfering spirits. Ryou blinked as he thought he saw the end of a somewhat familiar purple cloak slither around the nearest corner.

Despite the fact that he'd already had more than his healthy dose of darkness for the day (and would most likely have Bakura to contend with at work later), Ryou found himself hurrying forward – _just to check, just to make sure..._

Unfortunately, he was so intent upon seeing around the corner before doing so was actually physically possible that he wasn't really paying attention to where he was walking. His foot caught on a misaligned slab in the sidewalk, and he found himself clattering to the ground with the groceries rolling in all directions.

"Oww..." he moaned, pushing himself up onto his knees and examining his grazed hands. He heard an unabashed laugh from further down the nearby side-street and, turning to look with a searing glare, sure enough saw Mariku standing sniggering a little way away.

"So it _was _you," Ryou muttered, going back to examining the damage to his palms, "Great."

"And it's you too," Mariku said with a grin, though he kept his distance.

"Yeah, me," Ryou grumbled, "Will you stop _laughing, _that really hurt!"

Malik's darkness stopped chuckling immediately, his angular face becoming solemn.

"Hurt?" he repeated apprehensively.

"Yes," Ryou snapped, holding up his slightly bloody hands for the other to see, "I'm sure it looked _funny,_ but at least be polite..."

"It was pretty funny," Mariku remarked plaintively, "But hurt isn't funny..."

"Whatever..." Ryou mumbled, shaking out his carrier bag (which, luckily, hadn't torn) and starting to gather up the scattered items, "If any of these are damaged, I'm going to hit you..."

"Why is it my fault?" Mariku asked with a look that was almost a pout.

"You could at least help," Ryou growled.

"You didn't say you wanted help..." Mariku said, looking genuinely perplexed, which only served to irritate Ryou further.

"God, forget it," he grumbled, picking up the last escaped item and putting it back in the bag. He got to his feet and winced – these jeans had a hole in the knee, and so that knee was now nicely scraped.

"Are you angry?" Mariku asked dubiously.

"Please don't ask me dumb questions right now..." Ryou groaned. Mariku frowned.

"Don't be angry. How am I meant to know you want help if you don't say so?" he almost whined. Ryou really couldn't believe he was hearing this.

"Oh come on...you mean if you see someone fall, you won't do anything unless they _ask_?" he muttered, "That's pretty bad..."

"...I don't know a lot of things," Mariku said, suddenly looking awkward. His violet eyes were trained on the ground.

"Get serious," Ryou snapped, brushing himself down, "When someone's hurt...there are some things you don't have to be taught!"

Mariku's frown deepened.

"No," he said steadfastly, appearing very certain, "No, even if you've forgotten, I'm sure you were taught those things at one time."

Ryou was about to throw out an acidic retort when he was suddenly and unexpectedly assaulted by an old memory – a day when he was four years old when he, for no particular reason, aimed a kick at a bird pecking breadcrumbs. He'd missed, but that was hardly the point. His mother, nonplussed, told him sternly that that was _bad – _maybe that bird had babies back at her nest and now they'd go hungry. And he'd cried and felt terrible. He'd never tried to hurt an animal after that – he liked them. But he'd had to be told. _That was bad, Ryou. That was wrong and here's why..._

"...You really don't know that stuff?" he asked softly, pulling himself back to the present, "What hurts people and what's bad and...?"

"I told you, I don't know a lot of things," Mariku said again.

Ryou was silent. He'd been four years old when he'd learnt that other things felt pain just like he did, that people should help each other, that certain things were _bad..._

"I'm learning, though," Mariku went on suddenly with a more hopeful expression.

"Um...good," Ryou said uncertainly. It felt a little strange to be talking to someone standing half-way down a side-street, but Mariku wasn't showing any sign of coming any closer, and Ryou didn't really feel like approaching him at the moment.

"At least I'll know to help you next time," Mariku said with another grin, "You look like someone who falls over a lot."

"Hey..." Ryou said in annoyance.

There was a short silence.

"Have you seen Malik yet?" Ryou asked finally, figuring he should just come out and ask.

"Of course I've seen him," Mariku said, "I told you that."

"I mean, has he seen you?" Ryou clarified with a frown. Mariku laughed.

"Are you worried?" he asked, looking mischievous.

"Yeah," Ryou said frankly.

"Don't be. He's not seen me. And he won't. Not now, anyway."

"Then...what do you do all day?" Ryou asked, puzzled, "Where do you go?"

"Watching, mostly," Mariku said simply with a small nod. Ryou felt his skin crawl.

"Malik?" he questioned nervously.

"No, just people," Mariku corrected him, "People everywhere. I watch and I learn."

"I see..." Ryou said, looking away uncomfortably. All those fundamental life-lessons that he'd learnt at the gentle hand of his mother (during those short years when he'd had her there), Mariku was apparently learning by observing complete strangers. How could those lessons have any meaning when the people you learnt them from meant nothing to you...?

"I don't understand," he went on suddenly, "Why do you need to...'learn'? How do you not...I mean...how don't you _know_?"

"Hm," Mariku said, tilting his head over to one side, "Omote never told you much about me, did he?"

"No," Ryou replied, wondering if this was going to answer his question in any way, "I told you. He doesn't like to talk about you."

Ryou had no intentions of sparing Mariku's feelings on that matter. The spirit certainly didn't seem as sociopathic as he'd been led to expect, but his allegiance still lay firmly with Malik.

"...Do you know what day it is today?" Mariku piped up after another moment of what Ryou had assumed was contemplative silence.

"Wow...you really aren't going to answer my question at all..." Ryou commented dully, his tone deadpan but not really surprised.

"If you don't know what day it is, you've forgotten something _important,_" Mariku informed him with a nod, "I know. And I don't know a lot."

"So you keep reminding me..." Ryou muttered, "It's Friday. Twenty-second of December."

Mariku nodded at him expectantly, eyebrows raised.

"...There is nothing important about the twenty-second of December..." Ryou said, eyeing the other suspiciously.

"There is," Mariku said, another slow grin spreading over his face, "If you're doing a countdown."

"Oh God, you sure as hell better not be talking about Christmas-" Ryou started before it hit him pretty hard, "Oh...Tomorrow. Malik's birthday."

Mariku nodded sagely.

"...And your birthday, too, I guess..." Ryou finished uncertainly after a moment. Mariku frowned.

"I don't think so," he said plaintively, "I wasn't ever born."

"Oh...yeah..."

Ryou folded his arms, sliding the handle of the plastic bag up to the crook of his elbow to stop it cutting into his grazed hands, and looked at the ground ponderingly, chewing on his lower lip. It wasn't like he'd _forgotten _Malik's birthday, it was just that the two of them didn't really do the whole birthday thing by mutual consent. After all, they were both perpetually broke (to varying extents and for differing reasons, but that wasn't the point). And, more importantly, Malik didn't consider his birthday anything worth celebrating. To him, it was just a reminder of the worst, most painful day of his life.

"He shouldn't be alone tomorrow," Mariku spoke up suddenly, frowning at the ground.

"Have you been learning about birthdays too?" Ryou asked with a small smile, "Malik's kind of different. He doesn't like to make a big deal of it. In fact I don't think he likes to think about it at all..."

"I _know_," Mariku said shortly, frown deepening, "But he shouldn't be by himself. It's been ten years. Ten," he held up all ten of his fingers, looking frustrated about something, "That number seems important, somehow."

"Yeah..." Ryou murmured with a nod, "You're right. It's going to be like the tenth anniversary of..._that..._"

"So don't leave him alone," Mariku persisted, "When he saw you at that shop, he was happy...even if you made him sad later..." Ryou's face flushed somewhat, "I don't mean be with him to remind him what day it is. Be with him to help him forget."

Ryou sighed sadly.

"You do care about him, don't you?" he said softly, "_He _said you didn't, but he lies all the time..."

"Who?" Mariku questioned, though something about his look suggested he knew already. Ryou narrowed his eyes at him suspiciously.

"What? Can't you say it?" Mariku said with his crooked smile, "Is it so hard...?"

"..._Bakura_," Ryou spat out finally, glowering.

"The Thief," Mariku said with an affirming nod.

"And to think everyone used to call me that...I didn't know thieves could steal names..." Ryou muttered irritably before his expression softened again, "But about Malik...it's just...everyone told me that...you wanted to hurt him. Always. So why...why now...?"

He trailed off when Mariku just laughed quietly and smiled furtively at him, seeming to retreat a little deeper into that cloak at the same time. Ryou knew he wouldn't get any answers. Malik's darkness was starting to remind him of the Cheshire Cat.

"Maybe I'll watch you too, from now on," Mariku said, looking thoughtful, "Maybe I'll learn something besides how to fall over and shout at people."

"Hey..." Ryou complained again. It irked him that the eccentric spirit always seemed to say very teasing things but in a way that clearly wasn't meant to be teasing. It was like the unthinking honesty of a smart child.

"Uh...but, you know..." he went on after a moment, once his brief annoyance faded, "You don't need to just 'watch'...I mean, you don't need to hide from me. If you see me or...or whatever, you can just talk to me."

Mariku blinked at him, doing his little head-tilt again. Ryou wondered if it was just a habit of his.

"Is that ok?" the yami said with a puzzled frown.

Ryou thought of Malik's overwhelming, borderline irrational fear of this spirit, and of all the awful things he was supposed to have done. He also thought of how pissed off Bakura would be if he knew he'd been talking to the other darkness again.

"Yeah, it's ok," he said with his best attempt at a smile, "Besides...I'm not sure exactly what you're trying to learn by 'watching' people, but you learn a lot more by actually talking with someone."

Mariku didn't seem to be listening. He was peering at Ryou with an intensity that was almost unsettling.

"You must not smile much," the yami said finally, that grin spreading over his angular face again, "You look like you've forgotten how to do it properly."

Ryou, who had been expecting something much more soul-searchingly-deep after that contemplative gaze, felt his face heat up again and scowled, more than a little flustered. Mariku sniggered.

"You make _that _face perfectly, though," he said, "Well done."

"I don't even know if you're joking," Ryou said in exasperation, turning around and walking away briskly, shaking his head all the while.

He only made it a short distance before he came to an abrupt halt – not because anything in particular had pulled him back or stopped him, but simply because he suddenly _knew, _without a doubt, that Mariku was right behind him. He froze, thinking once again of all the horror stories he'd heard, wondering if he should be a lot more scared than he was-

Somehow, he felt strangely unable to turn his head to look. Instead he looked down, and saw that deep purple cloak pooled on the ground just behind his feet. He swallowed hard. So far Mariku had seemed harmless enough, but surely Malik and the others hadn't been making up all those things they'd told him...?

A pair of copper-coloured hands suddenly swooped round to grasp one of Ryou's much paler ones. Ryou felt even more under threat when he noticed how much bigger than his own Mariku's hands were – they certainly looked like they could crush small bones...

He blinked when the yami brushed his fingers delicately over the still-stinging grazes on the palm of his hand.

"...That looks sore up-close," he heard Mariku say very close to his ear, "But don't cry. If you fall again while I'm watching, I'll catch you, hm?"

Ryou went to reply (though he wasn't sure _exactly _what he planned to say to that) but found that his voice had momentarily deserted him. The hands retreated, and after a moment Ryou found it in him to turn around.

Mariku was gone. Ryou stared around, utterly baffled. How did he...?

"And the weirdness just never ends..." he muttered finally, shaking his head again and turning away, wondering if he'd actually make it home this time without any further diversions.

* * *

_**It's done, it's done-!**_

_**Regarding Yuugi and Malik's weird little race earlier – I work in a shop. Whenever it's really quiet and boring, we always fight for the phone when it rings.**_

_**And Mariku is back by popular demand – with ninja skillz, apparently. (Is it just me or is Ryou being stalked by all three spirits?) He wasn't meant to appear again until later but everyone seemed to be missing him a lot. And before anyone asks: no, it's not deathshipping, and no, Mariku's mysterious ability to disappear is not an important plot-point. That's just Mariku xD**_

_**I offer up his unscheduled reappearance to **__**Tenshi no Toki**__**, who loves him lots :P And by the way, you should all go read (and **__**review)**__** her stories. Go, now! She's the most under-appreciated writer I know. **_

_**Gigantamongous big thank you's to Bokmal14, Tunazap, Twilight-Imp-626, KrystalMountain, KATZUNITED-MEOW-, Adlam-Yang, Tenshi no Toki, PurpleRanchDressing0987, , subaru1999, ParadoxalPansy, AuthorsNote1, Airyballoon, Franklyn, .SaNiiTee., felton0fanatic, I Dance The Tango, Anon., Thief Mistress Thorn, Schizo-of-Destiny, Harutemu, scrambled-eggs-at-midnight, Madam Crim, albino-yaoi, AliceCambio, ScarlettKuasta, Anubis46545, SunnydayinPallet, chibi heishi, ACE329, StrawberryAshes, ani, FantabulousWatapon, Lachen, NW, Ceilo, Teal Phoenix, FanFicFanGurl101, His-Bloodthirsty-Princess and . You all raise me up so I can stand on mountains :] **_

_**And an extra-special thank you to **__**Shantih**__**, who only started reading last chapter but left me lovely reviews for every single chapter ;-;**_

_**Seriously...400 reviews. I never thought I'd see the day D: I really never expected so many people to like this story so much...I'm so happy x3**_

_**I need to apologise in advance, though. University starts back tomorrow, so from now on time for writing fanfic will be extremely limited. I don't know if there's going to be a hideous gap between this chapter and the next, but if it starts to look that way, I'm sorry Dx**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x **_


	16. Feeling Sorry

_**Chapter 16: Feeling Sorry**_

It was an odd sort of night at the Lot for Bakura. Ryou was in a funny, subdued mood – the reason for which he couldn't hope to even guess – and hadn't bothered to so much as snap at him the entire evening. He did seem genuinely distracted, though – the silence between them wasn't the same windpipe-squeezing, soul-crushing kind that Ryou usually conjured up when he was feeling particularly intolerant.

"He's awful quiet tonight," Kazuma remarked, "You guys kiss and make up or something?"

"_No_," Bakura snapped irritably at him (and getting no fearful response as usual).

"...Yeah, didn't really think so," Kazuma said with a nod, "He's the wrong type of quiet. Weird."

Bakura said nothing, but he couldn't help but agree. Both Sato and that Hideki guy were in the house tonight, but neither of them succeeded in eliciting much of a reaction (good or bad) from the pensive-looking teen.

Hours later, when his shift was drawing to a close, Ryou still hadn't snapped out of it. Bakura watched as he mechanically wiped down all the worktops in the kitchen with a cloth, like some kind of robot that had been programmed to do exactly that. _Wipe, rinse, repeat. _He suddenly realised that, apart from his job, he actually knew very little about what Ryou did these days. He never saw him outside of this place, apart from when he was taking him home. Did he go out and spend time with friends? Did he have things he liked to do? Or was the rest of his life just like this – only doing the things he _had _to do, hating every second of it but doing it anyway? Was that all he knew how to do anymore...?

"Hey," Bakura grunted, breaking the silence. Ryou didn't bat an eyelid, "..._Hey._"

"I can hear you," Ryou said disdainfully, not bothering to look at him, "I'm just ignoring you."

"You're beyond bratty," Bakura muttered.

"Hn."

"Anyway, if you could stop acting like a three year-old for a few minutes," Bakura 'requested', earning himself a glower, "I was wondering. What do you actually do when you're not here?"

Ryou raised an eyebrow and peered at him, clearly suspecting some kind of verbal onslaught.

"I'm serious," Bakura said in annoyance, "What do you do?"

Ryou's wiping of the dresser tops was becoming increasingly furious.

"Why does it matter?" he asked shortly, not looking at him again – effectively confirming Bakura's fears.

"I don't know," Bakura said with a slight shrug, "Life's kind of short unless you plan on getting sealed away in an artefact for a few millennia. Seems a shame to waste it."

Ryou's hands stilled and he raised his head slowly to look at his yami. His brown eyes were narrowed, and Bakura sensed he had said something he really shouldn't have.

"I am not 'wasting' my life," Ryou said darkly, "_You _did that for me."

"Gods, it's always like that, isn't it?" Bakura snarled, his chronically short temper flaring up as he took another gut-punch of blame, "So now you want to be just like me, huh? And spend all your life just _hating?_"

Ryou gave one of those cold laughs that sent shivers down his spine every time.

"Like _you_?" he repeated incredulously, "You think that's what I'm aiming for? You think I'd really want to be like you_, _the one who's hurt me more than _anyone else_-?"

"Is that true?" Bakura challenged, perhaps foolishly. Ryou glared and walked right up to him, standing much closer to him than he ever did without dealing a blow, and thrust his left hand in front of his face.

Bakura blinked before his eyes focused again. Ryou's hand was slightly grazed, but it was clear that wasn't what he was meant to be looking at. In any case, what caught his attention was the round, silvery scar in the centre of the palm – Ryou's souvenir from that Monster World Game.

"Remember?" Ryou said with a thin-lipped little smile.

"...Yeah," Bakura said, his insides burning. His stomach heaved slightly when Ryou turned his hand around to reveal how the exact same scar existed on the back of it too – a permanent reminder of the limb's impalement. Bakura opened his mouth to say something (he didn't know exactly what) but before he could form one word Ryou snatched his hand back and pushed up the sleeve of his t-shirt to display another scar on his upper arm. Not round, this one, but ragged and messy, like a haphazard splatter of shiny whitish-pink paint. Bakura gripped the edge of the nearest worktop as it all came flooding back to him.

"Remember that one too?" Ryou asked with decidedly fake sweetness, "I'm so glad."

He tugged his sleeve back down and threw the washcloth into the sink.

"Time to go home," he announced gaily, marching into the cloakroom to get his jacket. Bakura followed a few moments later.

They didn't speak as they walked through the dark streets towards Ryou's apartment, until Bakura decided he needed to say something or he might explode.

"Does it hurt?" he blurted out. Ryou, momentarily off his guard, looked at him with a confused blink.

"Your hand, I mean," Bakura said, eyes trained on the tarmac, "Does it hurt to move it or...?"

He trailed off. He was aware of Ryou's eyes burning into him in suspicion for a few moments before the teen, like himself, fixed his gaze straight in front of him uncomfortably.

"Not really. Not anymore," he replied, removing the hand in question from his pocket and flexing the fingers thoughtfully, "It feels kind of tight sometimes. And it's not as strong as my right."

Bakura nodded in acknowledgement.

"And your arm?" he asked tensely.

"It healed just fine."

"...That's good," Bakura said, not sure why he was feeling such a copious amount of relief.

"It doesn't make it ok," Ryou said bitterly.

"No," Bakura muttered, "It doesn't."

"Like you care," Ryou mumbled, speeding up and walking slightly ahead of him.

"...What about Malik?" Bakura called to him after a moment. Ryou halted in his tracks.

"What about him?" he asked sharply.

"Do you blame him for your arm getting hurt?" Bakura asked, catching up to him, "It was really for his sake that...it happened."

"That you stuck a knife in my arm, you mean?" Ryou snapped, "No. You know as well as I do that Malik wasn't himself back then. He apologised anyway. But I never really blamed him."

Bakura bit down hard on his own tongue. _Of course you never blamed him. Why would you, when you could blame me, and blaming me was so damn much easier? _

He wondered if he should tell Ryou about Zorc now – explain to him that he hadn't really been 'himself' back then either. (Hadn't even been human.) He thought about relating the tragedy of Kul Elna to him, making him understand that he'd never been evil until he'd witnessed evil with his own eyes and lost everything at its hands.

But he stopped himself. Ryou needed someone to hate and someone to blame. He needed to know that his crappy life was someone else's fault, because without that everything would lose its meaning. He wasn't ready to hear the whole story.

Someday, Bakura decided.

* * *

Malik, once again, suffered a minor cardiac arrest when Bakura opened the door to the apartment.

"Woah," the yami said with a blink (since the blonde hadn't quite been able to compose himself before he noticed his very apparent fright), "What's up with you?"

"Heh...a really creepy-looking guy just walked into my living room," Malik said with a wan smile, "Wouldn't you at least jump a little?"

"No, I'd just kill him," Bakura said blandly as he hung up his coat before pausing and wondering if he'd just insulted himself somehow.

Sometimes Malik really was glad that his house-guest was so utterly dense.

"You look like crap," Bakura remarked as he slumped down next to him on the sofa. Malik just rolled his eyes at him, though he knew it was probably true. There were quite a few factors that might recently have melded together to give him a more harassed, haggard and overall frazzled appearance than usual. First and fore mostly, his least favourite day of the year was almost upon them. (In fact, according to the clock, it was technically _already _his least favourite day of the year by a few hours.) Generally, this in itself was enough to make him look more than a little bit ill. Add into the mix the return (and yet suspicious absence) of his darkness and the fact that Atemu and Otogi were treating him like a leper, and the likely result was a Malik whom any doctor would take one look at and prescribe lots of bed-rest and a shitload of herbal tea and antibiotics.

Not that he was going to mention any of that to Bakura, of course.

"And _you_," he said instead, "Look massively depressed."

This was also true. Bakura's eyes were dull and oddly guarded (usually when he was pissed, he didn't bother hiding it), and he seemed very dispirited – presumably about something that had happened that evening. And strangest of all, he hadn't mentioned Ryou yet. Not even to complain about him. He was holding back, and that just wasn't normal.

"What's wrong?" Malik asked cautiously, "Did he hit you again?"

"No," Bakura muttered, shaking his head.

"Then what?" Malik prodded, pulling his knees onto the sofa and turning sideways to face him properly.

"It's just..." Bakura started lowly, keeping his eyes on his lap with a slight frown creasing his forehead, "I mean, I know I've done some stupid shit. Back in Egypt, and then in the Ring, _and _since I've been back."

"Agreed," Malik said with a nod and a shrug. The yami gave a heavy sigh.

"But just now I realised that the most stupid thing I've done was thinking that _he _was stupid for hating me," he said haltingly, sounding as if he was having to force out every word of such a shameful admission, "I let him do it but I looked down on him for it. I thought he was being pathetic and looking for excuses. But I guess I forgot...just how bad I made things for him..."

"...So what reminded you?" Malik questioned, somewhat unnerved. It was bizarre and unthinkable, but it sounded like Bakura might actually have made some kind of logical breakthrough all by himself.

"His hand...and his arm," Bakura mumbled, "The scars. He...yeah..."

"Oh," Malik said simply, looking away. He supposed that was as effective a reminder as any. He kept his eyes downcast for a moment but Bakura sought out his gaze, seeming to need the eye contact. Malik was bewildered to see that the yami's expression was one of almost abject desperation.

"I mean..." Bakura said, shaking his head again, still looking at him with that face full of such strange anxiety, "How the hell do you apologise for that...?"

The world went very still for a few seconds that seemed to stretch into eternity. Malik stared, one hundred percent certain he'd heard wrong.

"...Apologise?" he repeated slowly.

"His _hand, _Malik!" Bakura hissed, holding up his own left hand as if this would somehow help him understand. Malik didn't actually know how Ryou had acquired that particular scar and he had no special wish to know the exact details, "When I saw that scar, I couldn't believe I did that...that's like torture..."

Malik swallowed hard, deciding that he _really _didn't want to know what had happened to Ryou's hand.

"...I need to do something," Bakura said agitatedly, "I remember it all now...shit, I..." he paused then looked simultaneously steadfast and totally unsure of himself, "I think I need to help him."

"What?" Malik gaped.

"I'm sick of saying 'I don't know' every time someone asks me why I'm still bothering with him!" Bakura snarled, "I need to _decide. _I might be just the bad guy, but...I don't _know. _Maybe this is one thing...I should make right..."

He trailed off and let out an angry growl.

"Or is _that _just stupid?" he muttered, "Why am I saying such weird things...? I didn't care when I hurt him before, so..."

"Zorc," Malik reminded him.

"Forget Zorc for a second, I said _I _didn't care," Bakura snapped, looking supremely agitated, "So why does it feel so bad now...?"

Malik laughed. It was quiet, but it sounded happy. Very happy. Bakura looked at him oddly.

"Hey," the blonde said with a broad, eyes-closed smile, "Welcome back to humanity."

Bakura blinked before looking away and smirking dryly.

"I should have known it would be something stupid like that..." he said mostly to himself, closing his eyes for a moment.

"Haven't you missed it?" Malik asked teasingly.

Bakura made a small 'pft' noise and turned away.

"Don't worry," Malik said consolingly, "It gets better."

"...I don't think it's just that, though," Bakura muttered, lowering his head so that his hair shaded his eyes, which were undoubtedly full of uncertainty, "There are people...'humans' who don't care when they hurt someone. But it's been creeping up on me recently, this bad feeling...and then when I saw those scars..."

He fell silent, head drooping a little further. Malik looked at him with puzzlement for a moment before smiling again.

"Then I guess that means that, before all the craziness started..." he said brightly, "You weren't such a bad guy."

Bakura sat up straight again, looking positively appalled by the very idea.

"Sorry," Malik sniggered, "Does that impact on your street cred...?"

"Idiot," Bakura grumbled. He turned his face away but Malik caught a glimpse of the bright red spots flaring up in his cheeks.

"But..." Malik started, expression becoming solemn again, "About Ryou...what are you thinking...?"

"...I want to help him," Bakura ground out. His face became visibly redder but he forced himself to continue, "He doesn't belong in the place he is now. He's a mess. And it shouldn't be like that..." he paused and then turned back to Malik with a scowl, "But don't think that I'm doing it to get anything out of it! It's not like I want him to stop hating me. He can hate all he likes. All that matters is that I fix this. I don't _like _him, I don't particularly _care _about him, it's just...this whole situation is so twisted, somehow..."

Malik's face went from serious to surprised to content in quick succession.

"Well done," he said, "You got there in the end. And you finally said it."

"Huh?" Bakura said with a confused blink.

"'I want to help him'," Malik repeated with a light laugh, "I'd hoped all this time that you would say that. I knew you could do it."

"Wha...?" Bakura gaped for a moment before glaring, "If you wanted me to say it so badly, why didn't you just tell me? That might have made things _a lot _easier."

"No it wouldn't," Malik said with a frown, "You had to work it out for yourself. I didn't want you to say it just because I wanted you to."

"Like I would," Bakura snapped, folding his arms.

"But...you said you don't want anything in return. You just want to 'help' without getting close to him? Isn't that a bit half-assed?" Malik said, mischief lurking in his eyes.

"Nothing's good enough for you, is it?" Bakura replied, not really surprised at this development, "It's not like he'd want anything like that anyway."

"Hm, yeah, it would be _really _difficult," Malik conceded, "But wouldn't it be nice if you could walk into a room, and he'd turn around and smile at you...?"

Bakura stared at him, lost for words. The blonde just kept smiling.

"You're crazier than usual tonight..." Bakura remarked finally, closing his eyes tiredly.

"Well done," Malik said again, feeling so content that he almost forgot what morning would bring. Almost.

* * *

The twenty-third of December dawned crisp and bright. It was cold (so cold that they said snow was coming soon), but the sky was watercolour-blue and the sun shone, lighting up the wintry city. A beautiful morning, all in all.

Not that it made it any better.

"Are you sure you're ok?" Yuugi said unhappily into the phone. He apparently received a 'yes' in response, since he sighed heavily and nodded, even though Malik couldn't see it, "Alright, just...take it easy, ok? And try and cheer up, it's not so bad...ok, bye..."

He sighed again as he hung up.

"Same as last year?" his grandpa questioned with a sad smile. They were both in the staff room of the Game Shop for the last few minutes before they opened for business.

"Of course," Yuugi mumbled, "It really is like a day of mourning for him."

"That's unfortunate," Sugoroku remarked gravely. He himself didn't know what had happened to make Malik's birthday such a taboo, but he didn't consider it his place to be nosy about it. He simply understood that it was a _very bad day, _"But you know, Yuugi, while I don't mind giving him this day off by any means, I don't really understand why he asks for it. I know otherpeople always want their birthdays off work, but that's because they want to go out and _celebrate._"

"I know what you mean," Yuugi said, nodding again, "And I always thought that working would help take his mind off it. But I think he prefers to just hide himself away the whole day. It's like a punishment or something..." he paused and then frowned, "But I suppose this year he's got more reason than ever to want to stay away from here. I mean, if he was feeling down already, and Atemu and Otogi started that nonsense again, I don't know what he'd do..."

"They certainly aren't giving him a break," Sugoroku agreed, "I try not to leave him alone with either of them, but it's hard to keep track when the shop gets busy..."

"I know," Yuugi said with a grimace, "I guess we'll both just have to keep doing our best. And hopefully those two will come around eventually."

* * *

Bakura lounged on the sofa and looked on with mixed amusement and unease as Malik visibly grappled with the urge to smash his telephone into a billion teeny-tiny pieces. The teen's fingers were twitching in an almost homicidal manner and his face was stony, probably due to the concerted effort it was taking for him to maintain a light tone of voice for the sake of his latest caller.

"Uh-huh...yeah, thanks. Ok...yeah. Ok, bye, Anzu."

It wasn't really possible to make the action of pressing an 'end call' button look vicious, but Malik made a damn good attempt at it.

"Gods, I should just disconnect the phone for a day...but if I do that they'll probably all show up here in person..." he muttered under his breath, folding his arms and glaring at the floor.

"Many happy returns," Bakura drawled, fiddling with his cell phone, which he could now use to a certain extent thanks to Malik. (At the moment he was sheepishly wondering how he'd managed to turn the background pink and lilac, but he didn't think this was the most opportune time to ask Malik about that.) He had gathered by the end of the first phone-call (from the Pharaoh's light) that today was Malik's birthday, and also that the blonde wasn't too ecstatic to be another year older. Malik had actually been getting noticeably twitchier with every incoming call. Anzu had been the third. The second had been Shizuka Kawaii.

"Don't you start too," Malik snapped at him, chewing his thumbnail agitatedly, "I mean, _Shizuka? _I never even see her anymore-!"

"Obviously she remembers you," Bakura said with a small smirk, "I wonder why."

Malik gave an exasperated sigh and flopped down next to him on the sofa.

"I know they all mean well," he mumbled, covering his eyes with one arm, "But...come on, there's a _reason _that I hole myself up on this day..."

Bakura put the cell to one side. He could piece together a rough idea as to why Malik might want to hide himself away on his birthday and so decided not to ask.

"You should probably brace yourself," he said instead, "Don't you have one more call definitely still to come?"

"...From who?" Malik asked, blinking at him.

"Your brother and sister," Bakura answered with a raised eyebrow, having thought that this would have been fairly obvious. To his surprise, Malik just snorted humourlessly.

"They won't call," he said, shaking his head, "They never do on this day."

"Why not?" Bakura asked with a frown.

"Because ten years ago they stood back and looked the other way," Malik said bitterly, "At least they still have the grace to do the same now. I mean...it would be sickening if they tried to fix it _now_..."

Bakura, perplexed by the blonde's uncharacteristic severity, opened his mouth to question him further but was cut off by the sound of the doorbell. Both he and Malik froze almost comically before exchanging uneasy glances.

"Who is it?" Bakura hissed as quietly as he could.

"How should I know?" Malik shot back in equally soft tones, "Just stay quiet..."

"As long as it's not the Pharaoh, I don't care..."

"Hey!" yelled a voice from the other side of the door, "I can hear you in there! Open up, this is the police!"

Bakura's face went slightly pale and his expression jerked into one that seemed to scream '_seriously, __**what?'**_

Malik just rolled his eyes and gave a dry smile.

"I don't hear any police officer," he called right back, "I just hear a loud-mouthed wannabe."

"Are you disrespecting an officer of the law?" the as-yet-unidentified voice bellowed, "I'll put you in a cell for a night for that! And you'll only get bread and water! No dessert! No _birthday cake!_"

"Like I'd want that," Malik said in mild annoyance, "But still, how tyrannical...I guess you really must be a police officer."

"_Hah, _so you've realised! The powerful hand of the law is about to come down on you, punk!" that voice roared with glee. It seemed to be getting progressively louder. Bakura felt totally alienated from the whole exchange but he had a weird feeling that it really wasn't worth questioning it, "If you don't let me in, I'll break down your door with my bare hands! And you won't even be able to sue me for it because I'll tell them you were resisting arrest!"

"How evil..." Malik murmured.

There was a lengthy silence.

"...Seriously, Malik, could you let me in?" the voice resumed in a much more normal tone and volume. Bakura suddenly realised that he _knew _the voice, though he couldn't quite place it without seeing its owner, "One of your neighbours is staring at me..."

"What do you expect when you go around shouting like an idiot?" Malik said, rolling his eyes again and getting to his feet, "Moron..."

He walked to the door and reached for the lock before casting an uncertain glance back at Bakura.

"What do you want me to do, hide in the bathroom?" the Thief sneered, folding his arms moodily.

"Shut up-!" Malik hissed.

"Oi, Malik," the waiting visitor interrupted, "I've worked out by now that _someone _is there with you. Unless it's your super-scary dark side – which I doubt – I really don't care. You've gotta let me in, man, I think your neighbour is going to call the cops soon..."

"Can cops arrest a fellow cop?" Malik said in amusement, shaking his head and opening the door.

"Technically I'm only a cop-in-training," Jounouchi said sheepishly, coming into the apartment hurriedly. Bakura's mouth twisted in distaste. He really should have known that he was the only one with such an annoying voice.

"Lucky for me," Malik remarked, "Just don't call for reinforcements, huh?"

Jounouchi looked at him blankly for a moment before noticing Bakura.

"_Woah, _crazy Ring Spirit?" he openly gawked, "After Mariku, that was my second-last guess."

"It's a long story," Malik said wearily, "Though I thought Pharaoh might have said something to you by now."

"Oh, yeah," Jounouchi said with a blink, "Yuugi did say something a while ago about Pharaoh thinking you were calling him out for 'Round Two'..." he paused and sniggered, "Is that what I've walked in on here? You two getting reacquainted so you can wreak havoc on...what, the Game Shop? Are you going to under-price everything, Malik? You bastard, don't think that I, cop-in-training, will let you get away with such a..." he trailed off when he realised that Malik and Bakura were looking at him with very un-amused expressions, "Oh. Are we not laughing about this yet?"

"What's he talking about?" Bakura asked with a suspicious frown.

"Nothing," Malik replied blandly.

"It sure as hell is not 'nothing'," Bakura growled warningly.

"Pharaoh thinks you and I are cooking up some hideous scheme for world domination. Or something. I'm not actually very clear on that part," Malik said flatly, folding his arms and not looking at him, "Basically he thinks I'm regressing."

"Why didn't you ever mention this before?" Bakura demanded in disbelief.

"What good would that have done?" Malik asked in surprise.

"I don't _know, _but it's not exactly something you keep quiet about-!"

"Why, what would you have done? Gone and kicked his ass in my defence?"

"Like I'd kick his ass for _your_ sake, I don't need an excuse for that-!"

Their squabbling was cut short by Jounouchi's raucous laughter.

"Man, I can see why you two failed at Battle City," he guffawed with tears in his eyes, "That was almost cute..."

"_Cute?_" Bakura repeated scathingly, eye twitching.

"I have to say, Jou..." Malik interjected before Bakura could chew the other blonde's face off, "You seem pretty calm about...this."

"About what, you and Ryou's crazy darkness catching up and remembering the good old days?" Jounouchi snorted, "Am I supposed to be worried? Gimme a break, Malik...Pharaoh might be living in the past and Otogi might be a paranoid dumb-ass, but I know what a total wimp you are these days. I've been watching your steady badass-decay for the past few years, y'know? You're about as dangerous as a wet firework. And you're such a nerd, what are you gonna do, attack me with big words?"

"Thanks, Jou," Malik said dryly, pointedly ignoring Bakura's raised eyebrows, "I think."

"Yeah, I believe in you!" Jounouchi said with a grin and a thumbs-up, "And as for Mr. Scary Thief King there...he's not quite so scary without his evil Ring. I'm sure he's still a bastard, but he's like a cat that's been declawed."

"Was there any particular reason that you dropped by?" Malik asked, clearly fighting down a smile whilst Bakura visibly seethed in the background.

"Huh? Oh yeah, I almost forgot," the other blonde said with another guffaw. Bakura mumbled something that sounded like 'beyond stupid' and flopped back onto the sofa, "Yuugi asked me to deliver this."

He held up a white carrier bag. Malik accepted it dubiously and peeked inside. All at once several contradictory expressions were fighting for dominance on his face.

"A cake?" he said, shaking his head in disbelief, "Gods, I tell him _every year _not to bother..."

"I know, crazy, right?" Jounouchi agreed, looking bewildered, "I don't get it at all. I'm personally over the moon to have one less birthday present to buy. He said you probably needed some cheering up when I went to pick it up, though. Come to think of it, he probably meant the whole Pharaoh-thing...my bad."

"He worries too much," Malik said glumly.

"Look who's talking," Jou snorted, "You going to eat that, by the way? I will if you won't."

"I guess I'll force some down since Yuugi went to the trouble," Malik replied, "But you can take away whatever's left. I'll go find some drinks or something..."

He wandered over to the little kitchenette, placing the bag on the counter as he went and starting to root through the various cupboards. Jounouchi sat on the floor next to the coffee table.

"...He looks tired," he remarked quietly after a moment, "Or something."

Bakura blinked and frowned, uncertain whether he was talking to him.

"Fighting with the Pharaoh is a pretty tiring thing, I guess," he sneered in response with a shrug. Jou chuckled.

"You're really pissed that he didn't tell you about that, aren't you?" he said in amusement, "What are you, his boyfriend?"

"Shut up," Bakura snapped, folding his arms moodily.

"Hn...Pharaoh and Otogi better be careful, though," Jounouchi went on, looking a lot more serious all of a sudden.

"...What do you mean?" Bakura asked suspiciously.

"Heh. Like I said, Malik's Mr. Nice Guy these days," the blonde said lowly, "But everyone's got their limits. I figure if those two keep this up too long, he could still turn _very _nasty."

"I'd kind of like to see that," Bakura smirked.

"I wouldn't," Jounouchi said frankly.

"I officially have no soda," Malik called over, "There's some orange juice but to be honest I don't know how long that's been there..."

"Someone needs to go shopping," Jounouchi snickered, "I'm not thirsty anyway. I'm just here to steal your cake."

"Suits me," Malik said, taking the cake out of its box and starting to cut it into slices, "Want some, Bakura?"

"No," the Thief replied sullenly. His pride had taken a fair few beatings since he'd got back to this world, and he refused to sacrifice whatever was left of it by sitting and eating _cake _with his former partner-in-crime and one of his former nemeses. There was just something hideously degrading about the idea.

"Suit yourself," Malik said amiably, handing Jou a generous slice and taking a smaller piece for himself.

"Happy birthday," Jou said with a wide grin, "Don't you want some candles to blow out?"

"Shut up," Malik said absently.

Bakura was considering just leaving the apartment there and then, but he couldn't really think of anywhere he particularly wanted to go. He also got a weird feeling that leaving would be like losing to this idiot, somehow. He glanced at the time on his phone and confirmed that he could leave for his daily dose of bitching at Angels' Lot soon. He could last until then.

If he thought that he was going to get any peace even while Jounouchi was eating, however, he was woefully mistaken.

"So how's modern life treating you?" Jou sniggered in Bakura's direction between impossibly large bites of cake, "Or should I say 'how's Ryou treating you'? If you've had the guts to go near him, that is."

"You think I'd run away from a brat like that?" Bakura growled dangerously. Malik turned his face away to hide his smile, thinking back to Bakura's rather different attitude on the subject of Ryou the night before.

"I sure would," Jounouchi said, looking alarmed, "If he was mad at me, I'd run a damn mile. No shame in that."

"Maybe not for someone like _you_," Bakura sneered. Jounouchi snorted.

"To be honest, I hope he gave you hell when you went looking for him," he said with a humourless smile that somehow didn't quite fit with the crumbs and icing around his mouth, "I always thought he deserved the chance to hit you back at least once."

"Sure you did," Bakura muttered acidly, "If you ever thought of him at all."

Malik almost choked on the small amount of cake he had forced himself to eat. And by Jounouchi's startled blink, Malik would warrant that he had done pretty much the same. Since Bakura was a moron when it came to things like this, he probably hadn't realised it himself, but in throwing that particular accusation at Jounouchi he had effectively lit up a big neon sign saying that, on _some _level, he really did care about his former host. Malik closed his eyes and fervently prayed that Jou wouldn't say something to that effect, since that was likely to end in, at best, a lot of bloodshed.

"Heh. Didn't realise _you _had the moral high-ground on that one," Jounouchi chuckled dryly. His smile had become half-sceptical and half-wondering, and Malik just hoped the Thief didn't notice, "Think what you like, but it's not that I don't care about Ryou. It's just that I don't know how to deal with him," he paused and narrowed his eyes slightly, as if searching for something in Bakura's sullen expression, "I think a lot of people are like that."

"Whatever," Bakura mumbled, looking thoroughly bored with the conversation. He turned away, indicating that it was officially closed. Malik had a sneaking suspicion that he just hadn't liked the direction it had been going in.

Jou looked fully prepared to press on with the subject regardless but Malik decided to intervene before Bakura cracked and slit his throat for pushing too many, currently hyper-sensitive buttons.

"Hey, Jou," he spoke up abruptly, "How's Seto doing?"

As he had expected, the other blonde visibly blanched at the sudden change of topic.

"Why d'you ask that?" he replied with a nonchalance that immediately betrayed his nervousness.

"Back when I was still 'in the loop', I heard that you two had been hanging out together," Malik replied with a casual shrug, successfully concealing his inner sadistic laugh. He could still be pretty mean when it wasn't something serious. Anyway, it was his damn birthday. He'd allow himself this much, "I thought it was kind of cool. Y'know, since you two never used to like each other."

"Th-that hasn't changed! At all!" Jou spluttered, "No way do I like that asshole now! And it's not like we're 'hanging out', it...it's a work thing. Kaiba Corp's part of this _initiative, _local businesses working with local police, y'know..."

"I'm sure Seto would love to hear Kaiba Corp called a 'local business'," Malik remarked with a small smirk, "So he's been giving morale speeches to trainee cops? That...makes sense."

The look on his face gave away the fact that he clearly thought that such an idea made no sense at all.

"I think you're making fun of me," Jounouchi said sulkily.

"I'm sorry," Malik said with a grin that was just a little bit insincere.

"Except you're not," Jou grumbled good-naturedly, "Whatever. Kaiba's an asshole, but at least he's useful. Me and Yuugi managed to bug him into 'providing' Pharaoh with some ID and stuff. So now he, like, legally exists."

He paused and laughed awkwardly when he noticed the almost identical sour expressions that had appeared on Malik and Bakura's faces.

"Not that that's anything you two want to hear about..." he said, scratching the back of his head.

"Think you could bug him into 'providing' another set of that stuff?" Malik said suddenly, gaze trained on the table. Jou looked puzzled for a moment and then his eyes went so wide that they looked like they might pop out of his head.

"For him?" he gawked, pointing at Bakura as if the Thief couldn't blatantly see and hear him, "That's...I mean, come on, Malik, talking to him is one thing, but..."

"Hey, you think I want him hanging around my apartment forever?" Malik said, doing his best to keep his voice light. He didn't want to push this too far – far enough to make Jou start considering Pharaoh and Otogi's point of view, "I'll never get rid of him if he doesn't even _exist. _Jobs and mortgages don't come easily to nobodies, you know."

"Wait, you mean he's _living _here? Man, is _that _like a sitcom gone wrong," Jou gaped.

"Come on, please?" Malik implored with his best smile, "It can be your birthday present to me."

"Nice try, Mr. Mention-My-Birthday-And-Die," Jounouchi muttered, "Alright, I'll give it a try. For you. Not _you_," he declared, pointing at Bakura again. Bakura had remained silent through this whole exchange and remained so now, "I don't think Set- ...Kaiba will like it, though."

"You could always bribe him," Malik 'suggested'. Jou laughed.

"You want me to try and bribe a billionaire?" he questioned, "My monthly income is probably less than Mokuba's allowance."

"I didn't mean with money, Jou," Malik said bluntly, the mischievous smirk returning to his face without shame. All the amusement abruptly drained from Jounouchi's expression. His face seemed torn between flaring up bright red or going deadly pale.

"You're still a jerk, Ishtar," he groaned, folding his arms, "Jerk, jerk, jerk..."

"Through and through," Malik agreed with a blithe smile, "Are you done eating? I'll wrap up the rest of the cake for you."

"Ooh, now he's a _courteous _jerk..."

Bakura had feared they'd be stuck with Jounouchi's company for quite some time, but the blonde seemed oddly willing to leave following Malik's subtle injection of Seto Kaiba into the conversation. Whilst the Thief couldn't fathom the precise reason for this (surely the idiot couldn't hate Kaiba so much that he couldn't even stand to talk about him?), he was prepared to offer thanks to whichever God made it possible.

"Good luck upholding the law," Malik said as he saw his friend to the door, "And say hi to Seto for me."

"Why would I do that?" Jounouchi howled right back at him, clutching the tinfoil-wrapped slab of cake so tightly that Bakura didn't think there'd be much left of it by the time he got it home, "And why would you want to say hi to him _anyway-?_"

"It's only polite," Malik told him cheerily, "See you later."

"Whatever," Jounouchi huffed before pausing, "If Mariku shows up, tell him I have the power to arrest him now, ok?"

The humour in Malik's eyes died.

"I'll do that," he said insipidly.

"Bye, then," Jou said with a grin and a salute, obviously not noticing the other's change of humour.

Malik closed the door. He didn't say anything for what felt like a long time.

"When did you become friends with that moron?" Bakura asked gruffly, mainly just to break the uncomfortable silence.

"I never made a note of it on my calendar," Malik said absently, "It just happened, I guess. He's a good guy. Clueless, but good. Whenever I feel like things are getting too messed up and complicated, I usually go talk to him."

"...Why didn't you tell me about the Pharaoh?" Bakura asked abruptly. That little matter piqued his interest a great deal more than Malik's unlikely friendship with Katsuya Jounouchi.

"I don't understand why you think I should have," Malik said quietly with a shrug. His mood had clearly dampened again in the absence of Jounouchi's exuberant babbling.

"I don't know," Bakura growled, "He only thinks those things about you because I'm here, right? So...so I should at least _know _about it...!"

_And it must have been tearing you apart, keeping it to yourself. You must have felt sick, coming home and smiling and knowing that you'd have to go back to that the next day. You must have been hurting __**so badly-**_

"Sometimes..." Malik started hesitantly, "Sometimes I think that, for Pharaoh, you're just...an excuse," it was clear that he'd been trying to keep this possibility from his mind, and as he said it the full hopelessness of it seemed to slam down on him, "I wonder if he would have found a reason to hate me anyway...?"

"Maybe. He's an idiot and a bastard. But right now, I'm his 'reason'," Bakura said stonily, looking at the carpet, "And...Ryou, too. He got mad at you, because of me. And, damnit, even that idiot Jounouchi. Asking him to get _ID _for me? He could have turned on you just like the Pharaoh did...!"

"Yeah, but he didn't," Malik said, shrugging again, "It doesn't matter."

"Stop saying stupid things like that," Bakura snarled, raking a hand savagely though his white hair, "Of course it _matters, _this world is all about give and take, right...?"

"I'm not sure what you're talking about," Malik said dubiously, "But it's not like I'm trying to put you in my debt. You finally said you wanted to help Ryou, right? That's good enough for me."

It didn't feel like enough to Bakura, though. Unbeknownst to him, he'd caused Malik's day to day life to become a hell of a lot more difficult, and then he hadn't _exactly _been the easiest flat-mate to deal with once the blonde got home at night. And here was Malik, on the anniversary of the most hideous day of his young life, telling him that it didn't matter.

"Why does everything just bounce off you?" Bakura demanded irritably, "No one should be so unaffected by things like this..."

"Unaffected?" Malik repeated with a short, hoarse laugh, "Please. Maybe everything that's happening just now is plain old _shit, _but at least it distracts me from what's _really _bad..."

Bakura frowned questioningly. Malik looked away, out the window.

"Mariku?" Bakura asked uncertainly after a moment.

Malik visibly shuddered.

"...He's out there," he whispered. The fear in his eyes was almost shocking, "I know he is. Why is he so quiet? What's he waiting for...?"

"He won't hurt you, Malik," Bakura said suddenly – steadfastly. If anything, Malik's expression became even more wretched.

"You don't know that!" he moaned, wrapping his arms tightly around himself, "Pharaoh said that too, but none of you know anything...He _exists _to hurt people, and he hates me for trying to lock him away..."

"Malik," Bakura said with annoyance, grasping the agitated boy by the shoulders, "Don't you get it? _He won't hurt you. _Ok?"

Malik looked at him blankly for a moment – and then he understood. (Which Bakura was eternally grateful for, because he would have hated to say it out loud. It was, after all, pretty shameful.) Anxiety continued its frantic dance in his lilac eyes, but he gave a small smile that wasn't entirely forced.

"I see," he said, "That's nice of you."

"What's nice about it?" Bakura snorted, letting him go and turning away, "I always protect my 'landlord'."

Malik's expression darkened considerably.

"Yeah, you did a really great job of that first time around," he pointed out dryly.

"Shut up," Bakura muttered before glancing at his phone again, "Speaking of which, it's time to go deal with the repercussions of 'first time around'..."

"Good luck," Malik said, his face becoming much more sympathetic.

"Saturdays aren't usually too bad..." Bakura mumbled, pulling on his coat, "None of the sleazy perverts are there, so there's less to annoy him. It's usually just...way too quiet..."

"Don't expect any kind of miracle, by the way," Malik cautioned, "From him or from yourself. Just because you finally got around to thinking that you should help him doesn't mean that things are going to change straight away. You'll probably still hurt him. You'll definitely still get mad at him."

"I know," Bakura snapped, feeling his face burn. _And __**he'll**__ most definitely still try and psyche me out at every turn, and he'll certainly still have to frequently remind himself of the jail sentence he'd face if he just gave in and killed me..._

"As long as you do," Malik said patiently. Bakura wondered where he got that patience from, "I get a feeling that you two are going to have to take quite a few more shots at each other before anything will start to smooth itself out."

"You talk as if we're going to relationship counselling or something," Bakura snorted, shaking his head, "There _is _no relationship, Malik – of _any _description. Believe me. And that's not what I'm trying to change."

"Yeah, yeah," the Egyptian said dismissively, waving a hand at him, "Hurry up or you'll be late. You wouldn't want Ryou to think you've given up, would you?"

Bakura shot him a dark look but complied, patting his pockets to make sure he had everything he needed and then leaving the apartment.

Malik let out a long breath in the new silence. As much as he loathed this day, he always preferred to be _completely _alone on it. That way, if he cracked and fell apart, no one would be around to see.

His isolation didn't go uninterrupted for long, though. After barely ten minutes, the phone rang for the fourth time that day.

"Fucking _hell, _does it never end?" Malik growled, not bothering to conceal his hideous mood now that he was by himself. He stomped over to the phone, fully prepared to rip the face off of anyone who would dare to call and wish him a 'happy birthday' when there was _no such fucking thing _in his world-!

"What?" he snapped as he picked up the phone. Once again, he was surprised to be answered by a laugh, but this time it wasn't his sister.

"_Wow...good morning, Malik. I guess I'm not your first caller? You sound kind of...feral."_

"Ryou, hi," Malik said with an awkward, sheepish laugh.

"_Don't worry, I know better than to phone you to tell you to have a happy day," _Ryou assured him, still sounding faintly amused at Malik's ferocious phone manner, _"By the way, he isn't there with you, is he...?"_

Malik frowned for a moment, wondering who the other boy meant before figuring out that he could only mean Bakura. He was beginning to notice that Ryou used his yami's name about as infrequently as Bakura used his.

"No, he left already," he told him, "He should be popping up at your end sometime soon."

"_Good, I timed it perfectly then," _Ryou said triumphantly, _"Ok I'll make this quick. I just called to tell you that you should be ready to go out by about....hm, say eight o'clock tonight?"_

"...Why, where am I going?" Malik asked suspiciously.

"_You're going out, and you're going to get so utterly wasted that you won't even remember it tomorrow. Funnily enough, I'm coming too."_

"You want to go clubbing?" Malik translated with some amusement, "I thought people who worked in clubs wanted to do anything but at the weekend."

"_I'm making a special exception for you. You should be very grateful."_

Ryou sounded pretty cheerful, which was a surprising but nice change. Malik found that he was slightly tempted by the idea, if only to see his friend for the first time since the incident in the Game Shop, but his usual apprehension about going over his door on his birthday still clung to him.

"I dunno, Ryou, you know I prefer just to stay at home on this day..." he mumbled uncertainly.

"_Yeah, I know," _Ryou said with a sigh, _"And I know you think that's the best way to deal with it. But trust me on one thing, Malik..." _he paused for a brief second, _"You should never underestimate the healing power of alcohol when you're trying to forget about something."_

"That sounds...pretty ominous..." Malik said with a weak chuckle.

"_Come on. I'm making a special exception for you...why don't you make one for me?" _Malik could just tell by Ryou's voice that the other boy was pouting, _"Anyway, I miss you..."_

"You're a manipulative little bastard sometimes," Malik informed him, laughing despite himself.

"_Takes one to know one," _Ryou shot back evenly.

There was a long, weird silence.

"_So, eight o'clock?"_

"Yeah. Right," Malik said, not entirely sure how he'd been talked into this.

"_Great," _Ryou said. Malik could hear the smug smile in his tone, _"I'll meet you outside your apartment building, ok? Don't think for a minute that I'm coming inside when he's there..."_

"I thought that..." Malik said dryly, "Alright, I guess I'll see you then."

"_I feel your enthusiasm," _Ryou remarked, _"Ok, I need to actually start working now...see you later."_

"Bye."

There was a click as Ryou hung up. Malik sighed and returned the phone to its stand, still dully surprised that he'd just agreed to go out and make merry tonight when all he really wanted to do was loll around on the sofa watching brainless day-time TV until he fell asleep. And maybe eat some junk food.

"You'd think I just got dumped," he said out loud to himself, laughing weakly at the idea.

* * *

Ryou stuffed his cell phone into the front pocket of his grey hoodie (something he always preferred to do over leaving it in his jacket in the unlocked cloakroom) and returned to the first task of his shift: heaving bags of garbage out into the street for collection. Not that they were actually collected very frequently. He was always very wary of rats in the area just outside Angels' Lot's staff entrance.

Grabbing one in each hand by the handles and praying that the thin plastic wouldn't tear, he dragged them across the tiled floor and out onto the sunlit-if-freezing street outside. As he did his best to balance them on top of the overflowing bags and bins already present, a small, dry smile spread its way across his face.

"There, I called him," he said without even looking away from his chore, "Are you happy now?"

"I suppose," Mariku said dubiously with a shrug. He was perched on top of a nearby dustbin like a bored-looking vulture, "I still don't understand why you have to leave him alone _all day_, though."

"I can't go see him now because I'm working," Ryou said exasperatedly – not for the first time that day, "I can't just wander off whenever I feel like it."

"You mean you don't just do this for fun?" Mariku said curiously.

"_No, _that's not what 'work'...means..." Ryou trailed off when he saw the impish smirk on the other's face and realised he had been joking, "Hm. I guess you learned that already."

"Yes," Mariku confirmed with a snigger.

"You're learning to be a real jerk, too," Ryou muttered, though it was without much real annoyance, "Anyway. I think Malik feels worse at night, so it's probably better if I can keep him distracted then."

"Omote doesn't like the dark?" Mariku questioned quietly, fiddling with the trailing hem of his cloak. Ryou wondered how the spirit could possibly remain inconspicuous, dressed like that.

"Not generally," he said with a nod, "And especially not on his birthday."

"Hnn," Mariku started, looking thoughtful, "It's really good that you're going to see him, then. His mood is kind of scary today. And the sun is shining just now..."

Ryou frowned and opened his mouth to question that remark, but abruptly closed it again when Bakura came around the nearby corner. The Thief in turn stopped dead in his tracks when he caught sight of the two of them. His eyes narrowed and hardened when he recognised Mariku.

"You," he hissed.

"And you," Mariku 'replied' without a great deal of interest.

Bakura tore his angry glare away from Malik's darkness and fixed it on Ryou instead. His look was surprisingly cold – to the extent that even Ryou noticed it.

"Making friends, hikari?" he asked scathingly, "I didn't know you were _that _desperate."

Ryou visibly stiffened but refrained from making any snappy comeback – perhaps realising that such a thing was getting predictable by this stage.

"You should probably go," he said quietly in Mariku's direction as he turned to go back into the kitchen, "There are some people you _don't _want to learn from, you know?"

"I know," Mariku said with a slow grin. Ryou returned it with a slight smile before closing the door firmly.

"...His smile still looks wonky," Mariku commented, "He really needs to practice."

"What are you doing here?" Bakura demanded stonily. Malik's darkness regarded him silently for a moment.

"What are _you _doing here?" he shot back finally.

"I..." Bakura started angrily before realising he still didn't have a very concrete explanation – not one he was willing to share with _this _head-case anyway, "I don't have to explain myself to you!"

"Are you jealous?" Mariku asked softly, "What? Would you prefer I was with my own light?"

Bakura froze and immediately hated himself for it, because he knew Mariku had seen it.

"Stay away from Malik," he ordered darkly, fists clenched tightly at his sides.

Mariku gave an odd, crooked smile that looked almost sad.

"I'm here, aren't I?" he said, "Not there. So what does it look like I'm doing?"

Bakura didn't want to admit it, but he was slightly thrown by this conversation (or confrontation, as it perhaps was). He remembered only two Mariku's: the smirking, sly, slow-creeping-fear one, and the shrieking, vein-popping psychopath one. He could be mistaken, but the figure before him now seemed like neither of those.

"I don't need you to tell me to stay away from omote," Mariku said lowly.

"Then stay away from Ryou too," Bakura growled. Mariku blinked mildly.

"I don't think that's up to you," he said dubiously, "Even if you are worried."

"I'm not worried!" Bakura snapped automatically in response.

"Oh," Mariku replied blandly. His tone betrayed neither sarcasm nor disbelief.

"...You seem...different," Bakura said suspiciously after a pause.

"You don't," Mariku sniggered, "At least, not much. Things like that take time, don't they?"

"Huh?" Bakura said intelligently.

"Changing. It's slow, right?" Mariku clarified, "It can take years, I guess...three years, maybe...or four...?"

"What are you saying?" Bakura demanded, his patience officially shot. First Jounouchi and now this? A Thief had his limits.

Mariku slid down from his trash-can perch and stood with his arms folded.

"Where have you been for the past three years, Thief?" he asked, tilting his head over to one side, "Did you feel those years go by...?"

Bakura frowned uncertainly. Thinking about it, he didn't actually know exactly where he'd been during his lengthy absence.

No, that was wrong. He did know. He'd been dead. He'd been in suspended animation for three long years and he hadn't felt a moment of it.

He swallowed hard as a few pieces fell into place. Mariku hadn't been dead. He'd been sent to the Shadows to rot.

"Time goes slowly in the darkness," Mariku said with a slow smile, seeming to know that he'd understood, "There isn't much to do except think...and think...and maybe change..."

"I don't believe you," Bakura said with a deadly certainty that he didn't really feel all the way through.

"It's too bad though," Mariku went on, disregarding his comment, "You have no idea how this world looks, after years of just...nothing..."

"This world is ugly," Bakura said shortly, "It always has been."

"You just have the wrong kind of eyes," Mariku said, gaze fixed vaguely on the sky.

"...Stay away from Malik," Bakura said again, hoping to sound more threatening this time. Mariku didn't even grace him with a reply – it seemed that the closed door of the Angels' Lot kitchen had caught his eye and reminded him of something.

"Hey, you should hurry up and get in there," he said suddenly, "What if he falls over...?"

"Um...what?" Bakura said with a raised eyebrow, not even trying to hide his total confusion.

Mariku just grinned and shrugged before slinking off down the narrow street, turning the nearest corner and disappearing from sight before it even occurred to Bakura to call after him.

Bakura stood unmoving for a few minutes, quite baffled by the whole experience. He eventually concluded that he now understood only one thing for certain: Malik's memory and mental image of his darkness did not match up with the bizarre reality.

He shook his head as he finally pushed open the staff door, wondering if Malik should be more or less scared than he was at present.

* * *

_**OMG FINALLY –dies-**_

_**Incidentally, way back at the start of this chapter (if you can remember that far back), Ryou was in a funny mood because he was still thinking about his little encounter with Mariku. But I couldn't really explain that because that scene was from Bakura's perspective. LOL Fiver didn't think that through.**_

_**Be honest. When Jounouchi was shouting about being a policeman, how many of you thought someone had sent Malik a strip-o-gram for his birthday? I think it would be weirdly cute if Malik decided to specialise in criminal psychology, and then the two of them had to solve cases together. (OMG I SMELL A SPIN-OFF.)**_

_**And yay, Bakura got his induction into the weirdness and wisdom of Mariku xD**_

_**The biggest thank you's in the world go out to Teal Phoenix, Twilight-Imp-626, Ceilo, saturnoutlaw, HerTenderTouch, pride1289, chibi heishi, Niilan, scrambled-eggs-at-midnight, schoolkid, KATZUNITED-MEOW-, subaru1999, Madam Crim, DistanceBetween, Atomic Lightbulb, Wolfwhispers, albino-yaoi, ani, KrystalMountain, ParadoxalPansy, Mikoura, Shantih, ANIMELUVR, Tender Loving Care, I Dance The Tango, PharaohDeli, Tenshi no Toki, AliceCambio, PurpleRanchDressing0987, Hotaru Layla, The One Called Demetra, Enjeru, StrawberryAshes, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, Unown, ScarlettKuasta, .SaNiiTee, Itkk022, Junki, felton0fanatic, ACE329, Bokmal14, Strange Liou, looot, Franklyn, Charley Reede, Anime-fan Meepa, Schizo-of-Destiny, Calm Envy, lily, BloodyPoisonKiss, Red-Eyes-Black-Dragon101, His-Bloodthirsty-Princess, ArlieseBirchwood, Airyballoon, julielaughs14, Snap Change, Adel Mortescryche, lovenyami, lo, stick-up-his-ass-Uchiha and Angael. You are legend. Yes, all of you :] **__**Honestly, thank you so much for all your amazing reviews. **_

_**Anyway, I hope that very long chapter made up for your very long wait u_u **_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x **_


	17. There For You

_**Chapter 17: There For You**_

"...I can't believe you've been talking to him," Bakura growled quietly.

"To who?" Ryou asked innocently – which was a definite sign that he was doing his very best to get on his yami's nerves.

"You know exactly who," Bakura snapped.

"I don't see why you're throwing such a fit about it," Ryou said with a shrug, starting to pull mountains of food out of the cupboards and fridge to be cooked.

"Because he's a _fucking sociopath_," Bakura snarled impatiently, "You don't _know _what he's like, you weren't there during Battle City..."

"You're right, I wasn't," Ryou said shortly, "Where was I, again...?"

Bakura blinked and then scowled.

"Don't start..."

"Oh, I remember," Ryou said with a very, very fake smile, "I was stuffed in a box at the back of my own mind."

"You were never in a _box_," Bakura grumbled, folding his arms.

"I was never in control of my own body, either," Ryou shot back at him.

"...That's not even the _point-_!" Bakura protested.

"You shouldn't start arguments if you're just going to back yourself into a corner," Ryou said bluntly, firing up the oven.

* * *

"...I wonder how Malik's doing," Yuugi said glumly, glancing up at the clock.

"Relax, he'll survive," Jou said through a mouthful of cheesy puffs with a flap of his hand. He'd decided to drop by the Game Shop after his visit to Malik and had luckily caught his friend on a break, "He's managed it the past nine years, right?"

"Yeah, but...come on, Jou, you know what I mean," Yuugi said with an unhappy frown, leaning his chin on his hand.

"Yeah, yeah," Jou muttered, "He seemed ok. Not _good_, exactly, but...not crazy or manic-depressive either. Just kind of down. But that's to be expected, right?"

"Right," Yuugi sighed, looking at the floor dejectedly.

"Shizuka said she'd give him a call. I'm sure that'll cheer him up," Jou said with a snigger.

"You think?" Yuugi said with a blink.

"No, I was kidding," Jou said, rolling his eyes, "Knowing Malik, he'll probably just wonder why she even thought to call him. Seriously, for such a popular guy, he sure sucks at picking up...'signals'."

"Oh," Yuugi said in understanding, going slightly pink.

"It's weird, though," Jounouchi went on, sitting back with his arms behind his head, "Even though I'm pretty sure he's not interested in her, sometimes I kind of wish Malik _would _go out with Shizuka, just to keep her happy."

"...Why's that?" Yuugi asked with another confused blink. Jou snorted dryly.

"It'd give me peace of mind," he said, "I know he'd never lay a hand on her."

* * *

Meanwhile, Malik was sitting cross-legged on his couch, completely at the mercy of day-time television.

"Wow," he said dully as he flicked through the channels one by one, "I don't remember it being this bad last year."

His birthday was pretty much the only day of the year on which he sat mindlessly in front of the television for hours on end, since it was a good enough distraction and, more importantly, didn't require him to _think._ Thinking could prove fatal when he was in this sort of mood.

However, he was starting to notice a definite steep decline in viewing quality year on year.

"This is going to rot my brain..." he remarked as he flicked past yet another talk-show, on which yet another middle-aged woman was crying hysterically, "I should probably study or something."

Unsurprisingly, he was still sitting there a few hours later when Bakura got back.

"...What the hell are you watching?" the yami asked in apparent puzzlement as he shut the door behind him.

"I don't even know anymore," Malik said blandly, shaking his head in bewilderment.

"I'm really glad this day only comes around once a year," Bakura said bluntly, standing behind the sofa and frowning at the people on the TV screen, whom he didn't trust one bit.

"Me too," Malik said softly. This, naturally, led into quite an uncomfortable silence.

"...Aren't you going to ask how things went with...Ryou today?" Bakura questioned finally. He had started to make a concerted effort to refer to his light by name around Malik now, if only to put a lid on the blonde's wild and wonderful psychological interpretations.

Malik craned his neck backwards to look up at him. Bakura remembered what Jounouchi had said about him looking tired (or something), and suddenly realised he had been right. He had noticed the young Egyptian's appearance becoming steadily more strained over the past few days, but had never stopped to wonder if something more pertinent than an overdue college assignment was to blame.

"I don't think so," Malik said, shaking his head slightly, "I might get the other side of the story later. Should be a nice change. Variety's the spice, and all that."

"...What?" Bakura asked, raising an eyebrow and wondering if the blonde always went this strange on his birthday.

"I'm going out tonight," Malik informed him, arching his back and stretching. He'd been sitting in the same position for way too long, "With Ryou."

"What, like a date?" Bakura questioned with a smirk – hoping that he'd successfully covered his surprise at this announcement.

"Uh. No," Malik said with a blink, "More like...a distraction, I guess."

"Right," Bakura said, crossing the room to the window. He felt Malik's eyes following him.

"You look surprised," the blonde said. Bakura rolled his eyes and swore mentally – nothing got past this kid.

"He doesn't seem like the 'going out' type," he replied with a shrug, "Doesn't seem like he'd ever do anything for fun. I can't really picture him having fun."

He heard Malik laugh quietly. He didn't say anything further, but just continued peering out the window at the street below. He'd done so many times during his stay here, but this time it was different. He was looking for someone.

He remembered Malik saying, earlier that day, that he 'knew' Mariku was out there. He had that same feeling now. He didn't know if it was simply because he'd now seen the psychopathic creature in the flesh, but he just couldn't help but feel that if he looked out this window and checked every shadowy corner in sight, there he would be...

He narrowed his eyes. And there had been something _horrific _about turning onto that filthy street and finding his light with that monster. He supposed it was the sort of feeling normal people got when they saw a small child playing with a rabid dog. Ryou's stubbornness and stupidity really staggered him sometimes. It was pretty difficult to 'help' someone who so determinedly put themselves in the line of fire, time after time.

Bakura snorted. Maybe this was just Ryou's newest angle at killing himself by proxy.

The snort was without humour and it died pretty quickly. That was an un-funny and unpleasantly probable thought.

Another possibility had occurred to him, though – perhaps not a _worse _one, but nothing to grin and give high-fives about, either. Because he couldn't help but wonder if Ryou's seemingly uncharacteristic proposal of a night out had been inspired by their stormy conversation last night...or by something Mariku had said to him.

He cast an uneasy glance over his shoulder at Malik, who seemed to have been sucked back into his bad-TV-induced trance. He didn't think (he didn't _want _to think) that Ryou was so far gone that he would do something to hurt Malik deliberately, but it was possible that Mariku had planted some kooky idea in his head. _I want to see Malik. I'm not like your darkness. Maybe you could bring him someplace..._

Bakura growled quietly. He could just imagine that psychopath pulling his light's strings like that.

"What's bugging you so much?"

Bakura started and turned around to see that Malik was looking at him again, with a faintly amused expression on his face. He gave a small, dry smile – he really needed to start being more careful around the Egyptian teen, who, it seemed, was never not paying attention.

"Same thing that's always bugging me," he replied with what he hoped was a convincing sneer.

"Ryou?" Malik suggested.

"Got it in one."

"I hope you didn't put him in too bad a mood. That would make for a really shitty night out."

"...How close are you and he, anyway?" Bakura asked suddenly, "Since I got back, all he's done is yell at you for telling me where he works."

Malik looked away immediately. Bakura almost smirked – as a psychology student, he should really have known better than to do something like that.

"We're pretty close, I guess," the blonde said with a shrug, "Not as close as we used to be, but...y'know."

"No, I don't know," Bakura told him, "All I know is that, at some point during the past three years, you moved here and, within the same space of time, you two met up and hit it off."

"That's all you need to know, really," Malik said with a slight frown.

"What does that mean?" Bakura growled, "Can you at least tell me why you got it into your head to move here in the first place...?"

"No," Malik snapped, surprising him, "Because that's none of your business."

"But-"

"Back off," Malik said warningly, a threat flashing through his lilac eyes. Bakura grumbled irritably but he took the warning – not even he was dense enough to fail to notice that Malik's mood was slightly more...unstable than usual today.

"I told you my whole damn story," he muttered darkly, folding his arms.

"I didn't _force _you to," Malik pointed out, "Besides, that story needed to be told. Some things just need to be...buried."

"...I guess what I really want to know is..." Bakura said slowly, "Do you trust Ryou?"

Malik blinked a few times, appearing taken-aback.

"Yeah," he said finally, "Yeah, I do."

Bakura nodded stiffly and turned back to the window. He didn't move when he heard Malik stand up and pad over to stand behind him.

"I don't know what's worrying you," the blonde said uncertainly, "But I don't think Ryou is taking some kind of shot at you by going out tonight. I don't think it has anything to do with you at all. I know it's hard to believe, but..." he gave a small chuckle, "There are still a few things that are just between him and me."

Bakura nodded again, slightly consoled by the possibility that _maybe, _just maybe, Ryou did just want to spend some time with his friend.

He didn't tell Malik that he'd seen Mariku, though. And he didn't tell him that Ryou had seen him too, and spoken to him, at least twice.

As Malik had said, some things were better off buried. For now.

* * *

"Right," Malik said just before eight that night, "I'm going now."

He sounded supremely underwhelmed at the prospect, and looked about as far from enthused as he could get. He'd made the effort, though; since Bakura had got back, he'd noticed that Malik now dressed decidedly more plainly and conservatively, but tonight he looked a little like his old self. (Though, admittedly, he hadn't strayed back into midriff-skimming hooded top territory. Perhaps it wasn't a bad thing.) Instead of his usual well-worn denims and sweaters (the general uniform of students, Bakura had come to understand), he had polished up slightly with a half-sleeved black button-up shirt and perhaps his only pair of jeans that weren't fraying at the edges.

"None of that Battle City bling?" Bakura questioned with a raised eyebrow and a smirk. The gold cuffs, armbands and choker he remembered were, as usual, absent. He'd figured they would look a bit ridiculous with Malik's casual college-wear, but had expected the blonde to use any excuse to put them on again. However, as always the earrings were the only pieces of jewellery present – and those seemed like a habit and were usually hidden by his hair.

"No," Malik said absently, "It's not like I'm trying to impress people anymore."

"You say that like you're approaching middle age," Bakura snorted, shaking his head.

"Hn," Malik said, opening the door, "I've got my key so if you're going to bed, just lock up."

"I'm not an idiot," Bakura muttered.

"No, but you didn't have a lock on your door in Ancient Egypt, either," Malik said wearily, "I'll probably see you in the morning..."

"Hey, Malik."

"What?" he asked, sticking his head back into the apartment.

"Have fun," Bakura said with a grin.

Malik pulled a face at him and shut the door.

He made his way down the stairs, slightly amused by the sight of his scuffed sneakers poking out from under his decent jeans. He didn't really do smart shoes. Pushing open the door out of the building, he stepped out into the cold and dark. He looked around and saw that Ryou was already here (and possibly had been for a considerable time), standing with his back against the wall and his hands jammed in his jacket pockets.

"Hey," he said smilingly at his arrival, "I was starting to think you were going to stand me up."

"Of course not," Malik said with his best attempt at a smile of reply. Ryou pushed himself off the wall and they quickly fell into step.

It occurred to Malik that Ryou really would have just kept waiting out here indefinitely rather than actually come up to the apartment, or even phone, and thus run the risk of crossing paths with Bakura. He wasn't sure if he should be oddly impressed by Ryou's consistency and dedication to his animosity, or simply scornful of the childishness of it all.

"I hope you got a taxi here," he said, glancing at Ryou's usual thin jacket and the darkness all around them, which, he expected, would be even more ominous in South Domino.

"Of course," Ryou said brightly. The lie was so blatant that it was hardly a lie at all – just a line in a rehearsed and poorly-written script. An _accepted _lie. Malik supposed they both told little white lies so often that it had become a mutual agreement between them not to cause a fuss about the less important ones. So he just nodded.

"So where do you want to go?" Ryou asked, still sounding as oddly chipper as he had on the phone earlier. Malik wondered if that cheerfulness was entirely faked and solely for his benefit.

"My bed, actually," he said with a chuckle. Ryou shot him a look, "Ok, kidding. I don't know, I thought you were the expert."

"Me?" Ryou laughed, looking quite tickled by the idea, "All I know is the dump I work in, and I don't think that's the kind of place we want to spend the night in."

"Maybe not. It's not really aimed at the 'young crowd', is it?" Malik agreed.

"The 'young crowd'?" Ryou repeated, raising a teasing eyebrow, "Don't forget you just turned twenty. You're getting _old._"

"I feel like I just got used to being a teenager, too," Malik said dubiously. In truth, the unpleasant connotations of his birthday had almost made him forget that it was also just a matter of becoming one year older, and that this year in particular was meant to be a big step into the fabled world of 'adulthood'. The thought made him want to both laugh hysterically and sigh hopelessly. Not so long ago, he'd thought he'd forgotten what it meant to be a child. Now he felt that he was about as far from 'adulthood' as a kid could be.

"So how does it feel?" Ryou asked him, "Being out of your teens."

"Is it meant to feel any different?" Malik replied, "I sure don't feel suddenly older and wiser."

"You're wise enough, anyway," Ryou informed him.

"...Do you ever feel like you're basically still sixteen?" Malik asked, only half-jokingly.

"Uh...no," Ryou replied, not at all jokingly and looking slightly perplexed by the concept. Malik supposed Ryou was a bad example for such a thing and so didn't mention it again. (And he didn't mention that sixteen was only on a good day – usually it was closer to about ten.)

"Hey, I think I know a place," he said suddenly instead, "Not sure if it's actually still there, but..."

"Worth a try, I guess," Ryou said with a shrug.

They were currently heading away from the place Malik had in mind. They tried to change direction as inconspicuously as possible.

"How are things at your club, by the way?" Malik asked in the same light and horribly contrived tone of voice they both seemed to use so often. He wondered when he and Ryou had forgotten how to talk to each other normally.

"Please don't call it that," Ryou said with a shudder, "Same old, really. Except now I've got _him _to contend with as well."

"...And how's that goi-?"

"Let's not talk about that," Ryou said shortly.

Malik's hopes for that topic hadn't been all that high, so he complied.

"What about you?" Ryou asked, "How's work?"

"Yeah, it's been alright," Malik said with a shrug and a smile, "It felt a bit weird at first, working with Pharaoh, but an extra pair of hands never- _ow!_"

He cut himself off and gave a yelp of pain and surprise as Ryou unexpectedly elbowed him in the ribs.

"What was that for?" he asked in bewilderment.

"Notice that when _I _don't want to talk about something, I just say so," Ryou said with annoyance, casting him a disapproving frown, "I don't care what day of the year it is. Don't lie to me."

"What...?" Malik said apprehensively.

"It's not alright. I know it isn't," Ryou said, "Pharaoh's making sure it isn't."

Malik blanched.

"...How did you...?"

"He decided to grace me with his presence yesterday," Ryou explained sourly, "Seems like he's causing problems for everybody. And you're on his naughty list. What happened?"

"I made him angry, I guess," Malik said vaguely. Ryou opened his mouth to question him further but the blonde cut him off, "Hey, we got lucky. It is still here."

Ryou blinked and turned his head to look at the brightly-lit bar further down the street. A short laugh jumped out of his throat. It sounded kind of sad.

"This is familiar," he said, "We haven't been here since...y'know."

"Yeah," Malik said with a nod, "Back then."

"Wow, it really hasn't changed," Ryou remarked as they approached, "Still looks cheap and cheerful. Bet the prices have gone up, though."

Malik didn't reply. He was slightly taken aback by the same thing as Ryou – the place hadn't changed at all. The name above the door – 'ARK' in to-the-point block letters – was still slightly askew, and one of the lights directed at it was still flickering wearily, just like before. As they pushed the swing doors open and stepped inside, he saw that the interior had also gone unaltered. Same mismatched tables and chairs, same slightly patchy carpet, same random and bizarre false animal heads mounted on the wall. He started to wonder if this had been one of his better ideas. This place held memories strong enough to paint over those hideous ones of ten years ago – for a while, anyway. Regrettably, they weren't the best memories, either.

Ryou seemed to be having thoughts in a similar vein. However, he quickly shook himself and turned to Malik with a wry smile.

"First round on me?" he said, linking arms with him and heading for the bar.

* * *

_I sat in silence and stared into my drink. Next to me, Malik looked nervous. Not that that was anything new. Over and above everything else I was feeling right around then, I did feel pretty bad for calling him and making him part of my problems. (Of course, he never complained.) I'd said I needed someone to talk to. Only, now that we were here, I suddenly didn't want to talk anymore. It seemed pointless. I wanted to tell him that it was ok, it was enough that he was here and could he please stop looking so worried. But I didn't._

"_Ryou..." he started uncertainly._

"_I'm sorry," I said quietly, still not looking at him, "I just...I couldn't stay home tonight. It's just full of __**boxes**__, I couldn't look at it anymore..."_

_I saw him nod tentatively out of the corner of my eye._

"_When are you moving?" he asked softly._

"_Tomorrow," I told him. Saying it out loud filled me with the horrible realisation that __**this really was happening to me.**_

"_You didn't tell me it was so soon," Malik murmured._

"_Sorry," I said again. I took my first sip of my drink. I couldn't even remember what I asked for but it was something bitter and strong – probably too strong, "Are you sure we won't get ID'd in here?"_

"_Well, no..." he admitted, "But Jounouchi dragged me out here a little while ago and it was fine. He says they're pretty laid-back."_

_I blinked and then hoped he hadn't noticed – but he probably did because Malik noticed everything, especially when he was nervous. I hadn't known he'd been spending time with Jounouchi – quite a lot of time, presumably, if they'd started going out to bars. _

"_You're really starting to get along with everyone, huh?" I said as brightly as I could manage. It came out sounding pretty flat._

"_I guess," Malik mumbled. He looked embarrassed._

"_It's ok," I said, smiling at him, "It's a good thing."_

"_...You don't like them," he said, so softly I almost didn't catch it. He looked up awkwardly and our eyes met for the first time since I started spacing out and staring into my glass like a wannabe fortune teller. My smile faded a little._

"_That doesn't matter," I shrugged. I didn't bother denying it. I didn't particularly dislike Yuugi and the others (not anymore, anyway – I had gotten over that), but I definitely didn't like them either. I didn't have the energy for them. They didn't suit me._

"_Matters to me," he muttered under his breath, frowning slightly and looking away. I sighed._

"_Do something for yourself for once, Malik," I said tiredly. He laughed weakly._

"_That's not why I came back here, is it?" he said._

"_I'm still not entirely sure why you did come back," I admitted, managing a real smile since it was for him, "But I'm pretty glad you did."_

* * *

"...What do you keep smiling about?" Malik asked suspiciously. Ryou had a decidedly furtive expression lurking about his face.

"I don't know what you mean," he said innocently, even whilst visibly fighting down a smirk.

"Yes, you do."

"I was just thinking that I can't take you anywhere," Ryou said with a snigger, "It's like going around with a celebrity or something."

"What are you talking about?" Malik asked blankly.

"You're pretty dense," Ryou said teasingly, tapping him playfully on the head, "Can't you feel the eyes burning into your back...?"

Malik continued staring at him uncomprehendingly for a moment before turning to look over his shoulder.

"Subtle," Ryou mumbled, pretending to be absorbed in his drink as the girls at the bar squeaked and giggled, but Malik knew he was trying to smother his own laughter. He wasn't sure, but he thought he recognised one of the girls (who were _making eyes, _as his sister would say) from the group who had been in the game shop the day before. If he was right, this place was even more lax about checking ID than he remembered.

"Great..." he muttered to himself, mouth twisting from side to side as he hurriedly turned away again.

"Don't look so horrified," Ryou said, still chuckling to himself, "Take it as a compliment."

Malik fixed him with a look – the same wounded, gut-wrenching-anxious look he always had when something like this happened. Ryou's humour died.

"Wow," he said, shaking his head, "Twenty years old and you _still _make that face...?"

"What?" Malik said in puzzlement.

"You really seem to hate people looking at you," Ryou said with a small shrug, "I always noticed that. But you never looked like you would talk about it, so I never asked."

Malik went slightly red.

"Well...it's embarrassing, isn't it?" he murmured, shifting his gaze to the tabletop. Ryou frowned.

"When did you start thinking like that?" he asked wonderingly.

"I don't know, maybe when I stopped being so..." Malik trailed off and looking frustrated, as if he couldn't quite think of the word he needed. At length he sighed and gave up, "I don't know. I guess it's just something I'm not comfortable with. Something I don't understand."

"People thinking you're hot?" Ryou asked with a raised eyebrow. This time Malik's face absolutely went up in flames – partially because Ryou had said 'people' and not 'girls', which suggested he had a bigger problem on his hands than he had previously imagined.

"I was never the most sociable through school and stuff, but even I've been on a few dates," Ryou said before a slightly bemused smirk flitted across his face, "Not that those came to anything..."

"I never went to school," Malik reminded him.

"I know, but-"

"I never met anyone my own age until I was in my teens."

"Yeah, I know..." Ryou grumbled mildly, looking unconvinced but clearly not wanting to get into a full-blown debate. Malik supposed this was something they really should have talked about sooner. Ryou knew pretty much everything about him, but they'd always skirted around this subject as if it had something gross and contagious. Therefore Ryou, despite his insistence to the contrary, did _not _know.

"When I got out that hole in the ground and came here first time around..." Malik said falteringly, looking fixedly at his hands (his fingers were fidgeting in a way that was almost impressively demented), "I didn't even know where babies came from."

Ryou, who had just taken a sip of his drink, promptly choked.

"Sorry," Malik said. He could have timed that better.

"_Sorry? _Malik, that's...I mean..." Ryou gaped, still spluttering slightly.

"Crazy, I know," he finished with a dry smile, "Yeah. My father probably planned to tell me when it was my turn to 'carry on the tomb-keeper line'."

It seemed that it was Ryou's turn to go red now – his cheeks were crimson and he seemed very reluctant to look up from his drink.

"I guess this is why people always say home-schooled kids are weird," Malik said with a weak laugh.

"I knew you'd had to do a lot of growing up since Battle City," Ryou murmured, "But I didn't know it was _that _much."

"Yeah, well..." Malik shrugged awkwardly, "Point is, I was pretty clueless. Once I wasn't just giving orders anymore, I realised I didn't even really know how to talk to people..."

"I remember that," Ryou said with a small, fond smile, "You were cute."

"It didn't feel cute," Malik said, shaking his head, "But you see what I'm getting at? It's only recently that I've become comfortable getting to know people as _friends, _so..."

"So any more than that would be..." Ryou finished carefully, "Scary."

"Uh huh."

There was a pause.

"What do you think the odds are of any of those girls actually coming over here?" Malik asked at length, looking highly uneasy at the prospect.

"Absolutely zero," Ryou declared, dragging his chair around to sit right next to him and leaning his head on his shoulder in a way that, from a short distance, probably looked quite intimate. They glanced at each other and then they both burst out laughing. Malik took this as a sign that the alcohol was starting to take effect.

"I'm sorry, I dragged you out here to cheer you up, not depress you more," Ryou said with what was apparently meant to be a self-directed pout of annoyance, "Let's talk about something fun."

"Like what?" Malik asked in amusement.

"I don't know, I don't usually do 'fun'," Ryou admitted. He looked serious again, "But wait. While we're in depressing territory, I want to ask one more thing."

"...What?" Malik asked apprehensively.

"Why is Pharaoh angry at you? Really?"

Malik sighed.

"Like I said, I _made _him angry," he said with a shrug, "I challenged him. That's against the rules, you know? But I did it anyway..."

"That's not the only reason, though, is it?" Ryou said.

"What other reason is there?"

"...Bakura," Ryou said finally. The name seemed to leave a bitter taste on his tongue. Malik only just managed to refrain from raising an eyebrow. How interesting, "Pharaoh knows you're 'helping' him."

"There is that," Malik said with a nod. He caught sight of the simmering look in his friend's eyes, "Ryou, no."

"...No, what?" Ryou said with a surprised blink.

"Don't go blaming Bakura for it," Malik said with another sigh, "Just...don't."

"Why not? He..."

"He didn't do anything," Malik said, cutting him off, "He didn't _ask _for my help."

"...Why are you sticking up for him?" Ryou asked suspiciously.

"Because I'd prefer for you to be pissed at Pharaoh?" Malik suggested with a smile. Ryou didn't return the gesture. He just peered hard at him for a long, long moment.

"You _do_ like him," he said finally, narrowing his eyes. Malik chuckled.

"Maybe a little," he agreed.

"He's a bastard."

"I know."

"You know he comes to bother me at work _every night, _right?"

"Yeah," Malik nodded, his smile becoming quite knowing, "I don't think he likes the idea of leaving you alone there."

Ryou shot him a look of 'you _are _joking, right?'

"I'm sure he's completely horrible to you," Malik laughed, "But I don't think he'd let anything happen to you."

"Of course not," Ryou muttered, knocking back the last of his drink, "He gets _paid _for that..."

"Ryou..."

"What if someone told you Mariku was different now?" Ryou asked abruptly, ignoring Malik's startled jump at the name, "What if they told you he worried about you, and didn't want anything bad to happen to you? Would you believe them?"

"That's..." Malik started uncomfortably, "That's different. _He's _different. He's...you can't _reason _with him..."

"Funny," Ryou said, getting to his feet to make another trip to the bar, "I'd say the same thing about Bakura."

* * *

_I didn't want to stand up, or even move around too much, because I had a definite feeling that my head would spin if I did. I knew I should call it a night with the drinking, but I didn't want to lose this feeling it gave me. It felt like being a little bit fuzzy at the edges. As if nothing could properly hurt me._

"_Take it easy," Malik said tentatively as I emptied my latest drink, my straw making a hollow gurgle against the bottom of the glass. If he were just a bit different, if he were more sure of himself, I knew he would scold me for this. If he could recapture that arrogance and bravado he so famously displayed during Battle City (not that I saw any of that), he would shake me and scowl and tell me I was being an idiot. But everyone knew by now that that kid from Battle City was gone, and the person he left in his wake wasn't sure about anything anymore, least of all himself._

"_I'm ok," I mumbled. He didn't believe me (that much was written all over his face) but he nodded._

"_Do you want some help moving into your new place tomorrow?" he asked quietly._

"_No," I replied immediately, shaking my head rapidly. I felt my eyes burn and I hoped I wasn't about to start crying – and if I was, I hoped it was just the effect of the alcohol, "No, I don't want you to see it..." I turned to face him. By his perturbed and slightly panicked expression, I surmised that I had indeed started crying, "It's horrible. It's in a horrible place and it's dark and damp and there are rats living under the stairs and __**I hate it-**_!"

_Malik startled me by grabbing me in a tight hug. I blinked a few times, wondering if I was drunk enough to have dreamed this up (after all, it wasn't like him – Malik had the same reluctance to touch people as a person who knew they had a contagious skin disease and didn't wish to spread it). But it was real and it was nice, and in the end I just went with it._

"_Don't go there," he said in my ear. His voice sounded almost scared, "Don't go to that place."_

"_I have to," I told him, not for the first time._

"_No, you don't," he said (not for the first time, either), "Yuugi would take you in. I'd take you in. Any of us would take you in."_

"_And that's why I have to go," I said. He didn't seem to understand this – none of them did – but it didn't really matter, "I don't want to be anyone's charity case. I've had enough of being the one who always needs help, the one who always has to be saved..."_

"_But..."_

"_You saved me once already, Malik," I reminded him with a small smile, "That's quite enough from you."_

_He pulled away slightly to look at me. His face was carefully neutral, but his eyes looked troubled. Anxious. Gods, I thought a year here would have cured him of that. I supposed it was my fault – in part, anyway. I didn't mean it. When we became friends, I never thought it would be the kind of friendship that would just add more strain to his life._

"_You'll be careful, right?" he said uncertainly._

"_Yeah, I'll be careful," I said, though I wasn't entirely sure what he meant._

"_You shouldn't be somewhere like that," he said lowly, "Especially when you're still...not a hundred percent..."_

_I sighed inwardly. Of course that would be what he meant._

"_You need to take care of yourself. If you don't..."_

"_I'm fine," I told him, "Honestly."_

_He chewed absently on his lower lip, frowning._

"_You'll keep your promise," he said. I got a feeling like he wanted to look stern but had forgotten exactly how, "Won't you?"_

"_Of course," I assured him softly, leaning closer to him and putting my head on his shoulder, "Don't worry about that."_

_I felt rather than saw him nod. A few people were looking at us oddly but I didn't really care. It felt nice like this. Warm and kind of safe. I expected I wouldn't be feeling like this again anytime soon._

_That was all, though. Just nice, warm and safe. It kind of bugged me, because I felt like there __**should **__have been something more._

_I knew that if things were __**logical, **__and if things __**made sense, **__I would love Malik. If my life were a movie (it would be a terrible sort of movie, but never mind that), I would have fallen in love with him a long time ago and I wouldn't be moving to a cold, dark rat's-nest of an apartment tomorrow._

_But things just didn't work like that. _

* * *

Bakura blinked blearily a few times, realising as he slowly woke up that he had in fact dozed off for a while. It was pretty early, but his sleeping pattern as a not-quite club bouncer was actually more messed up than when he'd been the King of Thieves. He shook himself irritably, resolute to stay awake from now on. For some reason or other, he didn't really like the idea of Malik coming home when he was asleep. He was the type of guy who liked to give the impression that he didn't sleep at all.

Thinking of Malik led him onto thinking about Ryou – which led him to remember the dream he'd just woken from.

He felt his body tense up against his own will. He had reluctantly acknowledged the dream from his first night here as a little piece of 'reality', a memory of Ryou's that he had accidentally spied on, but had quietly hoped it would be a one-off incident – something residual coming from the reawakening of the link between him and his light. But this dream (if it could be called a 'dream') had most definitely come from the same gene pool as the first. Bakura had a very firm set of beliefs about the world, and one of them was that if something happened more than once, it was more than likely to just keep on happening.

He shuddered slightly despite himself, more intent to stay awake now than ever.

* * *

_**This is a prime example of what I like to call 'a chapter that really wasn't worth the wait'. Honestly, I'm sorry. It was better in my head. **_

_**Weirdest part of this chapter for me: 'Don't forget you just turned twenty. You're getting old.' And yet, at nineteen and twenty, Ryou and Malik still wouldn't legally be allowed in a bar or club in the US or Japan. That's just too weird for me! I have no idea where this fic takes place anymore. I was not going to all the trouble of getting the characters fake ID's when Malik is two years OVER the legal minimum age as I know it.**_

_**Sorry about the 'baby' thing with Malik xD It's one of those things that I thought was funny but also quite sad. He's often presented as being pretty promiscuous in fanfic, and always seems to know exactly what he's doing in certain situations, but it's like...he grew up underground! How would he know anything? ;-;**_

_**Super ultra mega thanks to Ceilo, Junki, HikariNoSage, schoolkid, HerTenderTouch, bbb136, Enjeru, KATZUNITED-MEOW-, felton0fanatic, lovenyami, The One Called Demetra, MarikuOC, DistanceBetween, scrambled-eggs-at-midnight, pride1289, Tunazap, Itkk022, Bokmal14, Super Special Awesome Attack, AliceCambio, looot, stevenlover101, Tenshi no Toki, bunnies-r-luv, Wolfwhispers, StrawberryAshes, Calm Envy, Loss oF SaNiiTee, SingingWrenn, Tender Loving Care, chibi heishi, Madam Crim, albino-yaoi, melisse, Teal Phoenix, MagnusSpark, haku fan1, Franklyn, ACE329, AdenFire, Seto K4iba1, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, new-found, I Dance The Tango, Atomic Lightbulb, Hikaru H.K, ani, PharaohDeli, Tears Parallel, Shantih, crazyhikari, A Soul Alone, Schizo-of-Destiny, Pork Steak the Grande, Wolfie, champagnesupernova72, PurpleRanchDressing0987, Kuro Ookami Hatake, CatOfTha'Dune88 and BloodyPoisonKiss. You are all like the Ash to my Pikachu :'D I'm really sorry there were no review replies last chapter, I felt so bad about that...but it was sort of a matter of 'post the chapter then run away and study'. All your reviews really cheered me up during the bleak weeks of exams, and I'll do my best to get back to everyone this time :)**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	18. AfterEffects

_**Chapter 18: After-Effects **_

Bakura glanced uneasily at the time. It was past three AM.

Although he 'worked' in a club catering almost exclusively for twenty-first century slime-balls, he didn't consider himself an expert on modern-day social drinking and clubbing. And so he didn't know what was considered a 'normal' time for a modern-day person to get home from a night of social drinking and clubbing. For some reason he had never expected it to be after three AM. Sure, he was stuck at Angels' Lot until around this late quite often, but that counted for very little. Because Angels' Lot was another world, a world in which Malik had absolutely no place, and the people who inhabited that world were of another species entirely – something base and degenerate.

He wasn't worried. Curious, maybe. Curious about why someone like Malik would _want _to stay out until this time when he didn't need to, and about what he and Ryou could even find to talk about for this long, if talking was what people did on nights out. And he was also curious about whether Ryou _had _gone and done something stupid, and inadvertently caused Malik to come face-to-face with his darkness.

Maybe he was a little worried.

He was getting impatient, too. Sitting here alone in the dark, his thoughts were going around in circles. All he could think about was that dream, but he couldn't make any sense of it. He didn't like the idea one bit, but he knew he needed to tell Malik about it – needed Malik to assure him that it all meant something and that it was all very _logical_. And most of all he needed Malik to tell him that what he had seen was real. Already his certainty of the dream's authenticity was wavering, just as his exact memory of the scene was starting to blur and fade. It had all made perfect sense at the time – but that was often the case with dreams, wasn't it?

No, this was different. It had all made sense at the time because he'd known everything at the time. He'd 'been' Ryou – and as such had held all his knowledge and memories. But now that he was awake, that in-depth awareness was gone, and all he was left with was what he had seen. One single evening out of three whole years. Out of context, it meant almost nothing. Only that it had been the night before Ryou moved to South Domino. And Malik had been there – sitting next to him, like he probably was tonight. But Malik had seemed so different, so had it really been real...?

"_You saved me once already, Malik. That's quite enough from you."_

Bakura groaned to himself and buried his hands in his hair, his fingernails digging into his scalp. His head was starting to hurt. Try as he might, he just couldn't remember what Ryou had meant by that. But he'd _known, _he'd known everything until the damn moment he'd woken up, and that was just too frustrating-!

The handle on the front door turned. Bakura started at the sound and turned around. He raised an eyebrow when the handle jiggled up and down a few more times before the person on the other side of the door actually managed to get it to open.

"Whoops," he heard Malik mumble when the door finally swung open and the blonde half-stumbled inside. Bakura watched with slight bewilderment as he proceeded to shut the door behind him and then tried, with apparent difficulty, to lock it. After a few minutes Malik seemed to give up on this task and simply slid down to sit on the floor, his back against the door. Bakura sat looking at him, blinking a few times and wondering if this was a sign the night went well or badly. When Malik eventually noticed his puzzled stare, his face broke into a lazy grin.

"Honey, I'm ho-ome," he announced happily – before promptly collapsing into what could only be described as giggles.

Bakura blinked a few times more.

"You're drunk," he said finally.

"Oh my God," Malik said, rolling his eyes, "I am so not."

He went to stand up but failed quite spectacularly – the sudden disorientated look in his eyes suggested that the room had just spun before him.

"Actually, yeah, I really am," he said with a sombre nod, slumping back to the floor.

Bakura shook his head. In Egypt, drunken people had been easy targets for thieving. Nowadays, they were the ones he occasionally had to separate from his light with a crowbar. It was easy to forget that 'normal' people ended up in this state sometimes too.

"Ugh...help me up," Malik whined, holding out both arms and flapping his hands.

"Whatever," Bakura muttered, getting up and hauling the blonde to his feet, "What did you do, crawl up the stairs?"

"Woah..." Malik mumbled (to himself, apparently), ignoring the question and concentrating on keeping his balance. His concentration looked like it might be going to waste. Bakura rolled his eyes and steered him over to the sofa-bed before allowing him to collapse onto it. Without even kicking off his shoes, Malik buried his head in the pillow.

"...This is your bed," he said at length, one amethyst eye peering up at Bakura sleepily.

"I'm not carrying you all the way to your own," Bakura said blandly, sitting down on the floor and leaning back against the arm of the sofa, "Just don't throw up on it."

Malik chuckled softly.

"I won't," he promised, "...Where are you going to sleep?"

"Like I sleep," Bakura snorted.

Malik laughed quietly again.

"...How was the night out?" Bakura asked stiffly, eyes fixed on his knees.

"Good, I guess," Malik replied through a yawn, "It got fun once we finished talking about all the depressing stuff."

"Depressing stuff? Like what?"

"Like you," Malik said with a grin, "And me. And Ryou. Gods, we're all so depressing."

"Hn. That's true."

Bakura had long since decided by this time that there was little point in asking Malik about the dream tonight. He wanted someone to talk sense to him, and in his current state, the blonde was unlikely to talk anything of the kind. Patience was not Bakura's strong suit, but he supposed it was better to wait and discuss the matter properly when Malik was once again clear-headed and lucid, rather than bring it up now and get a spout of drunken nonsense.

"...You were right, by the way," Malik said suddenly. Bakura jumped; he'd thought the blonde had fallen asleep, "Ryou doesn't...look so healthy."

"Working nights does that to you, I guess," Bakura said vaguely, shrugging.

"You don't look _that _bad," Malik said with a teasing smile.

"I've not been in that place for as long as him," Bakura pointed out, "And I'm not..."

Malik blinked slowly in puzzlement when he trailed off.

"You're not what?" he asked, propping himself up on his elbows.

"I'm not as miserable as he is," Bakura muttered grudgingly, looking away.

"Oh...yeah..."

Bakura's brow twitched slightly as a thought suddenly occurred to him.

"Is he drunk too...?" he asked incredulously. Malik sniggered.

"Ob-vi-ou-sly," he said, stressing each syllable. Bakura wasn't sure if this was for effect or simply because the blonde couldn't fluently pronounce the word at the moment.

"That...is a really weird thought," the yami said conclusively, nodding to himself. He wondered if alcohol made his light any mellower or just more prone to violence.

"It is?" Malik questioned with a blink, "What, does he never drink at work? Is he not allowed?"

"I'm pretty sure it's allowed," Bakura said with a grimace, thinking of every other waiter and waitress in Angels' Lot, all of whom seemed to be more or less legless most of the time, "He drinks sometimes. I don't know what. But he's never drunk."

"Huh. I guess if he drank too much, he might forget that he's supposed to hate being there," Malik said with a drowsy grin, "He'd probably never forgive himself if he ended up having fun in that place."

Bakura was mildly astonished by Malik's ability to hit the nail smack on the head even when he was completely wasted.

"...Sounds like he's starting to have a _little_ bit of fun, though," the blonde went on suddenly, expression almost sly with what he apparently considered a piece of red-hot news, "He mentioned some _guy_. Uh...Hideki, I think...?"

"Yeah, I know the one," Bakura said with a gruff nod. An image of the startlingly uninteresting young man came unbidden into his mind and he found himself wondering, once again, just what it was about him that caught his light's eye.

"You never mentioned him."

"He's nothing to do with _me, _is he?" Bakura sneered.

"You don't like him?" Malik said with barely-disguised impish delight, "How come? Just 'cause Ryou does like him? Or, or does it make you _mad_, some random coming and stealing the princess away...?" he paused before once again collapsing into helpless laughter, "Aha, Ryou's a princess..."

"Malik, if you have the energy to babble this much, you must have the energy to walk to your own bed," Bakura said dryly. The blonde made a comical sound of protest and flopped back down onto the mattress. A moment later, his slightly muffled voice came from amongst the pillows.

"Do you think he's good for Ryou?" he asked quietly, "I mean...do you think he's just...?"

"I think he likes Ryou. Like, for real," Bakura admitted grudgingly with a haughty shrug, "I mean...he always looks like he's wandered into the wrong club. He doesn't fit in there at all. The only reason I can think of for him to keep coming back is...y'know."

"Hm..." Malik said, "That's good."

Bakura wasn't entirely convinced that it was, in fact, good, but he refrained from saying anything.

"Hey," Malik said after a few minutes, during which Bakura once again assumed he had dozed off, "What time is it?"

"Uh," Bakura said, perplexed by the question and quickly glancing at the luminous screen of his phone, "About three thirty-five."

"Ha-ha," Malik said with evident glee, clapping his hands together, "Guess what?"

"...What?"

"It's not..." Malik said, pausing for dramatic effect, "My birthday anymore."

"...Great," Bakura said, rolling his eyes but smiling wryly despite himself, "Well done. You survived."

"Yeah," Malik laughed softly, rolling onto his back and looking up at the ceiling. Even in the dark, Bakura could see the humour slowly draining from his face, "...I wonder where I was by this time. Ten years ago, I mean. Wow, ten years..."

Bakura remained silent, out of a combination of odd respect and simply not knowing what to say.

"I was probably still...'asleep'..." Malik went on. Bakura glanced up at him quizzically and he shot a sad smile back at him before explaining, "Passed out."

"Oh."

"I don't know when I properly woke up, actually," Malik mused aloud, "Maybe I was awake by this time. Or maybe I was out for days. I don't know. It was always dark. And it always felt the same, whenever I _almost _woke up..."

He paused and swallowed hard.

"It felt like dying," he said finally. His voice was soft and distant. In his mind he probably saw the room, that torture chamber, again, every detail burned fiercely into his mind like a branding. His right hand had slipped over his left shoulder to trace the beginning of the markings – markings that couldn't hurt him anymore, except with the memory of the pain that came with their creation. Bakura looked at him with pity he would never admit to. What was he seeing right now – what had he seen in that underground chamber where he lay dying in the dark? The cold stone walls alive with the shadows of dancing monsters, cast by dim candle-light? Or had the darkness been complete? Had they really left a ten year-old to bleed alone in total blackness-?

"It's too dark in here," Malik whispered suddenly. Bakura frowned.

"Should I turn a light on?" he asked uncertainly.

"...No," Malik said at length, turning back onto his side to look at him, "It's not so bad when I'm not alone."

Bakura stared at him for a long moment before snorting to himself and nodding.

"Go to sleep," he ordered shortly.

Impressively, the words weren't long out of his mouth when the blonde finally did drift off, his breathing becoming steady and even. Asleep, he didn't look hurt or scared anymore. It was an untroubled sleep.

Bakura frowned deeply in the darkness. He could sleep like that because he wasn't alone – because _he _was here?

To him, that just didn't add up.

"But I guess that's worth more than half my shit wages..." he mused with another snort.

He wondered if Mariku had those scars too.

He hoped so.

* * *

_It was dark – the inky blue-black dark I loved so much for its richness and the stealth it leant me. In this darkness, in these shadows, I had learned to thrive. No squinting and burning in the eyes of Ra. Just me and the moon and the stars and the dark – and whoever I had chosen to rob that night._

_A small voice at the back of my mind – a child's voice, unmistakeably – whined and griped that the darkness killed the colours in everything. And the moonlight turns everything cold, it said, cold and hard and dead._

_I halted a moment, puzzled, wondering where I could have possibly plucked a thought such as that from. _

_The pause was brief, however. The childish thoughts were quickly swept from my mind, and I returned to exalting in my shadowy domain. Here, I was king of all things. Or, at least, the king of thieves._

_I laughed softly to myself. King of Thieves. I liked that._

_I continued on my way down this silent street, identical to so many other streets I had walked in the night. The newly-acquired items of jewellery, clasped cool and smooth around my arms, ankles and neck, gleamed in the pale moonlight. It was safer to take them this way – in a sack they would only clink and clatter and break the sleepy silence. I pulled the sleeves of my blood-red cloak (__**just grey in the dark, **__that whining child's voice put in before being swiftly silenced) down to cover the bracelets and armlets, though it saddened me to do so. I liked to look at them. Even after stealing so much and so often, I still liked to look at my spoils._

_The sleeves almost covered my hands, but it didn't matter. I was growing. And I was going to keep growing. _

_A nearby shadow shifted. A slithering, silent motion._

_I stopped in my tracks, frowning suspiciously. A timid night-animal? Or...?_

_The hand was over my mouth before I could even finish wondering. My eyes snapped wide in alarm and my thoughts erupted in a flurry of panic and outrage – __**you use the shadows to hide too? How dare you, how dare you use my own shadows against me-!**_

_A flash of silver in the dark. A blade glinting (cold, so cold) in the moonlight. Silver and cold but hungry for something hot and red-_

_(__**No red here, only grey and black in the dark...**__)_

_The blade swooped and dove, eager to meet my throat, wanting to slit it wide open and give me another mouth. I squirmed and jerked violently to the side, surprising my assailant and throwing him slightly off-balance, but not stopping him. The knife bit into the flesh of my face, slicing my right cheek from top to bottom and missing my eye by a hair's width. I choked on the scream I refused to let out. It hurt, it hurt so bad, it was like fire-_

_(__**Fire, fire, the fire-!)**_

_For that split second, while my head swam with the burning pain and I swallowed down the screams that kept trying to escape, I felt that I caught a glimpse of myself, as if from a distance. A horrible, pride-crushing glimpse. There was no King of Thieves here. Just a skinny boy, maybe fourteen by now (but who knew exactly?), in a cloak that was too big for him, about to be killed by a stronger and more cunning thief._

_The panic seized my mind completely. I couldn't die. I'd seen death, so much death, death was cruel and ugly and twisted and full of so much screaming and burning and that __**smell-!**_

_I had a knife at my belt. A knife that I used for peeling fruit and carving stolen bread._

_I had it in my hand. (How, when?)_

_No, the rough handle was in my hand. The blade was in his stomach. (__**How, when-?**__) So easy, so effortless. In and out. And again. Skin is soft. No bones in that place. In and out. Once more? For luck? In and out._

_He collapsed against me and some of the terror left my brain. I could think again. My hand was mine to control again. Stupefied, I stepped backwards. He crumpled to the floor. He didn't scream either, because he was a creeping night-thief like me. He spluttered and groaned and then stopped. Everything stopped. Everything._

_The knife slid from my fingers, landing next to where he laid face-down in the dust. My insides burned._

"_No," I said suddenly. I took a step away. My voice sounded oddly calm in the silky darkness, but I knew that wouldn't last. Something was climbing up my throat. Madness. Hysteria, "No. No! I didn't...I never..."_

_But I did. He was dead. Death had come for me and missed. I was surrounded by death again. It had come so fast. Swooped like a falcon. So mind-numbingly cruel and monstrous and without mercy. My hands flew to my mouth. The deep gash on my face oozed and dripped like a bloody tear-trail._

"_I was scared," I whispered to the night. My chin trembled. It was my only excuse, "I was scared! __**I was scared...!"**_

_I fell to my knees, crying out the pitiful excuse that wouldn't change anything. His blood was on my cloak. I'd always thought the cloak was blood-red but I was wrong because I could see the bloodstains. Dark, thick black against the dim grey. _

_My cries went unheard. No one woke. Or, if they did, no one cared._

_I thought I would go mad looking at him. Look what I've done. I killed him. IkilledhimIkilledhimIkilled-_

_**Enough.**_

_My mind abruptly went very quiet. Quiet and calm and hushed, like the inside of a temple. A blanket of darkness, like the night sky above, draped itself over my crazed jabbering thoughts and silenced them. _

_**Get up. It doesn't matter. You are above this. **_

_I blinked slowly. I knew that voice. The voice of the darkness itself, the darkness I served so faithfully-_

_**He was nobody. It doesn't matter.**_

_I got to my feet like a newly-awakened sleepwalker, numbly shocked at the fresh reality before my eyes. _

_Of course, it didn't matter. How could I have ever thought...?_

_**Kill before you are killed. Remember your family. Remember the snake.**_

_My forehead creased slightly. The snake? What snake?_

_That child's voice, tucked away at the back of my mind, wailed and screamed at the blood and the death and the dark. I knew what he wanted. He wanted me to care about this. To carry this dead man in my heart forever and never forget (__**like the snake, **__he sobbed, and I still didn't know what snake everyone was talking about) and let the shame and horror and pity strangle me slowly._

_But the darkness was so comforting, so easy to fall into._

_That child was so stupid. _

_I looked down again at the dead man and was seized by a powerful urge to vomit. Not with shame or horror or pity (after all, it didn't matter, he was nobody), but simply at the ugliness of him. A muscled man in life, now a lump of meaningless meat in death. Already starting to rot. So disgusting. So pointless. _

_My face twisted into a sneer, and I didn't even care how much it hurt. I nudged the corpse with my foot, repulsed by its very existence. I wiped the blade of my knife on the rough fabric of its clothes. Maggot-fodder. A meal for the vultures. A lump of meat that tried to get in the way of my __**destiny.**_

_**Good little Thief King.**_

_I straightened my cloak, made sure all my stolen jewellery was still safe against my skin, and walked away and left him to rot and stink alone._

_The darkness continued to soothe my mind. I was already contemptuous of myself for making such a shameful scene._

_I frowned in irritation. The cool hush of the darkness was incomplete. Through it all, I could still hear that child crying._

* * *

It was Ryou's own coughing that woke him. It was raw and hoarse and it hurt all the way from his chest to his throat.

He sat up (noticing with mild surprise that he was still fully dressed, minus one shoe) and coughed and hacked for a few minutes until the fit subsided. He then collapsed back onto the bed to catch his breath.

He sure was glad _that _hadn't happened last night. It would have been enough to fully trigger Malik's freaking-out mother-hen tendencies.

"Oh...my God..." he groaned, clapping a hand over his eyes to try and block out the sunlight, which felt like it was drilling twin holes through his pupils and directly into his brain. His throat was sore now that the coughing had stopped, but it seemed a small concern compared to the pounding in his skull. And the feeling of distinct unrest in his stomach. He lay very still for a few minutes, convinced that the slightest movement would cause his insides to purge their current contents in the least pleasant way.

"Shots," he mumbled aloud, peeking out cautiously from behind his fingers, "Did we really start buying shots? Why would we ever think that was smart...?"

He shook his head ruefully (and immediately regretted it) and managed to force himself to his feet so he could go in search of his missing shoe. Something else was gnawing at the edge of his consciousness, something more important than his AWOL shoe-

_Duh, you had another dream, just like that other one..._

-but he wasn't going to think about that. He shrugged his jacket off, quite stunned that he'd actually gone to bed and slept with it on, and threw it over the back of the sofa. He stretched gingerly – his sleep-creased clothes felt less-than-fresh and somewhat gross against his skin, but he knew there was no point in changing until he'd showered. With this in mind he headed in the direction of the bathroom.

_Come on, 'Thief King'? You've heard that before, haven't you?_

Shaking his head again (and almost falling over when his vision spun), he continued determinedly on his way. He made it to the bathroom, switched on the shower (which always took a while to heat up and never really got above tepid) and then realised his towel was still hanging over the radiator back in the living room. He went and retrieved it, and it was only when he crossed the hallway again that he noticed the shoe.

He stared at it for a long moment before palming his face without further comment.

In the end, when he did make it to the shower, he couldn't help but think about the dream. He didn't want to, but he did. It was the kind of thing that, once seen, was very difficult to un-see.

* * *

Bakura woke with a crick in his neck. Despite his decision to stay awake, he'd dozed off while still sitting on the floor, leaning back against the sofa.

He grumbled a few choice phrases to himself and got painfully to his feet, feeling and hearing his joints pop back into place as he did so. Glancing down at the bed, he confirmed that Malik was still dead to the world, and probably would be for quite a while yet. He took this as an opportunity to get his body back in working order before the blonde surfaced, and so headed for the bathroom to take a long shower, wincing and rubbing his stiff neck as he went.

He wasn't sure exactly how long he spent in the bathroom, but chose to believe that it hadn't been longer than an hour because only sprucing females took that long. In any case, by the time he emerged, fully clothed but still with damp hair, he was surprised to find Malik sitting up in the centre of the bed, looking bleary-eyed and lethargic but very much awake. He raised his head slowly and with apparent effort when he heard Bakura close the bathroom door behind him.

"...Hey," he said at length, "Want to know an interesting fact?"

"What?" Bakura questioned, nonplussed by this odd morning greeting.

"Interesting fact," Malik repeated, rubbing at his eyes, "Physically, Ryou and I have almost nothing in common. Except our shoe size."

When Bakura's blank stare only became blanker following this statement, Malik stuck his feet out from beneath the duvet, revealing that, although he was wearing a pair of shoes, they were not a matching pair.

"...You two swapped a shoe?" Bakura said apprehensively.

"Looks like it," Malik said with a nod.

"Why?"

"How should I know?" Malik groaned, covering his face with both hands, "You'd be surprised what can seem like an _awesome _idea after enough to drink. Swapping shoes, stealing cop hats, putting traffic cones on the heads of statues..." Upon noticing Bakura's increasingly disturbed expression, he hastened to add, "The last two are just examples."

"Right..." the yami said dryly, "I'm just glad you're sober again."

"Hooray for you," Malik muttered. He looked as if he had been trying to summon the strength and will to stand up, but in the end just lay down again, "Though I'm not sure if 'sober' is really the right word. 'Dying' might be more accurate."

He rolled his eyes when Bakura's expression became slightly alarmed.

"I'm kidding," Malik said patiently, "It's called a hangover. If you don't know, please don't make me explain it right now. Just...Google it."

"Just what?"

"Never mind," Malik mumbled into the pillow.

Bakura looked down at him, somewhat bewildered. He'd seen his fair share of drunken people, both in Egypt and here in Domino, but he'd never really seen a drunken person directly after the happy haze of the alcohol faded. He himself had limited experience with alcohol personally – of course he had drank moderately in his old life (hell, the beer had been safer to drink than the water back then) but he had always known that a shit-faced Thief King was most likely a dead Thief King.

"Where did you go last night, anyway?" he asked finally, deciding that a slight change of subject was in order.

"I can't remember _exactly _where we went towards the end," Malik's muffled voice informed him, "But first of all we just went to a bar...it's an ok place. We went there a few times, way back..."

Bakura frowned, casting his mind back to the sombre scene he had witnessed the night before.

"Is it the sort of place where none of the chairs match?" he asked.

"Um...yeah," Malik replied, sounding faintly surprised even through the pillow.

"And does it have animal heads mounted on one wall...?" Bakura went on, watching carefully for a reaction. He got one – Malik's head shot up so fast it looked like he might have rattled his brain.

"How do you know that?" the blonde demanded, brow creasing, "...Gods, you didn't follow us, did you?"

"No," Bakura snapped.

"Then how-?"

"What was the 'promise' he made to you back then?" Bakura asked suddenly, figuring he might as well throw everything he had into the mix while they were having this conversation – and, presumably, while Malik's guard was down, "What was so important?"

Malik's pallor had been a little off since he'd woken up, but he paled even further now. He seemed lost for words, so Bakura pushed ahead with one more question.

"And what did you have to 'save' him from?"

A short, strange laugh sprang from Malik's mouth. His eyes were narrowed, looking almost scared, and he was shaking his head from side to side.

"No, how do you...?" he started, moving a little further away from the yami, "Ryou would never have told you about that, never..." he paused, clearly trying to think of one rational explanation for this. Unfortunately for him, the real explanation was anything but rational, "Have you been looking into his head...?"

"For the last time, I can't read his thoughts," Bakura growled quietly.

"But..._how_...?"

"I don't really 'know' anything," Bakura said with a haughty shrug, "All I know is that there are things you aren't telling me."

"Of course there are," Malik said frankly, without any of the embarrassment or hesitation Bakura might have hoped for.

"Why?" he snarled.

"There are some things you don't deserve to know yet," Malik said, suddenly looking very tired, even for someone who hadn't got home until after three in the morning.

Bakura fumed silently, but he could see there was no point in arguing. Malik's lips were sealed. However, he figured that two could play at that game. If Malik wouldn't tell him what the dreams meant, then he just wouldn't tell Malik about the dreams. That seemed fair. (And not in any way childish, he tried to convince himself.)

"But..." Malik said softly, "How do you know about those things...?"

"Wouldn't you like to know," Bakura retorted.

"Well...yeah."

"Maybe there are some things you don't deserve to know yet, either," the yami sneered. Malik rolled his eyes.

"Whatever," he said wearily, lying down yet again and looking as if he had absolutely no intention of getting up again anytime soon. Bakura frowned.

"That's it?" he questioned.

"I'm not going to interrogate you about it. I don't have the energy, anyway," Malik said with a lazy wave of his hand, "Besides, I feel like I shouldn't give you a hard time today. You're working later, right?"

"Yeah, so?" Bakura asked suspiciously.

"So you'll get a hard enough time there," Malik chuckled quietly.

"From Ryou?" Bakura said in surprise, "I'm used to taking his crap by now. Besides, won't he be in a slightly less homicidal mood than usual after actually having some fun?"

Malik gave a laugh that was both sympathetic and slightly sadistic.

"If he's feeling anywhere near as shitty as I feel right now..." he said slowly, "I'd say you were in for a pretty rough ride."

* * *

Thanks to Malik's less than reassuring comments, it was with no small amount of trepidation that Bakura approached Angels' Lot that night. He paused when he reached the staff door, briefly wondering if he should stick his arm inside first and wave a white flag to show his goodwill – thereby possibly saving himself from instant slaughter. He quickly drew the conclusion that this idea was rather absurd, and so he simply squared his shoulders and hauled the door open and strolled in like he didn't have a care in the world – or indeed an increasing anxiety about how he was going to avoid a murderous rampage from his ill-tempered light in the course of the evening. Tread carefully, and all that.

The kitchen was empty. Bakura dropped his over-confident facade and gave a small sigh of relief. Hell, maybe he'd get lucky – maybe Ryou would have called in sick.

He snorted dryly to himself as he hung his coat away. Like that would ever happen.

As he crossed the kitchen, a small head popped out from behind one of the counters. In Bakura's current state of mind (which he blamed Malik for entirely, incidentally), it took all of his willpower to keep him from jumping a foot in the air. The head turned out to belong to Mio, who was sitting on the tiled floor amongst a pile of toys from the stash she kept in her make-shift bedroom.

"Hi," she said cheerfully. She, like her father, never showed any fear whatsoever of Bakura. The two of them didn't generally have much to do with each other (Ryou was and always would be her favourite), but every so often he would stumble upon her like this, and she would smile and talk and Bakura would stand and wonder what he was supposed to do with this babbling small person.

"Ryou's not feeling so good tonight," she went on with an unhappy frown, ultimately confirming Bakura's fears. He noticed that the toys surrounding her seemed to be a collection of child-sized medical tools, and she had a plastic stethoscope around her neck, "But it's ok. I gave him some medicine."

"Medicine?" Bakura repeated apprehensively. He wasn't sure if Aso would really be stupid enough to entrust his five-year old daughter with drugs, legal or otherwise.

"Do you need some?" she asked brightly. She was clearly quite enjoying her latest role as some kind of miniature health professional.

"No," he replied flatly (choosing not to add that he might need it later, depending on how Ryou responded to sickness).

"Let me check," she ordered, grabbing his shirt and pulling him down to her level. He was so surprised that he didn't even move when she slapped one small hand against his forehead and frowned in concentration. (He later supposed that he should consider himself lucky that she hadn't decided to shove the toy thermometer, which looked like it had seen better days, into his mouth.) When she was done with that, she put the stethoscope's earplugs in – and proceeded to press the small plastic pad against his left shoulder.

"I don't think that's..." he started before shaking his head and deciding it really wasn't worth it.

"You're very sick," she concluded finally, "Take two of these and you'll be better in no time."

She fished around in her cardigan pocket and counted out two small white capsules – which looked suspiciously like Tic-Tacs.

"Isn't that candy?" Bakura said with a raised eyebrow.

"No."

"I'm pretty sure it is."

Mio let her hand drop and sat down on the floor again, pouting sulkily.

"You're no fun at all," she grumbled, peering up at him from behind her bangs.

"Don't complain," Bakura said irritably, "It's more candy for you, right?"

She considered this.

"I s'pose," she said finally.

An odd silence fell after this, until Kazuma came lumbering in from the bar a moment later.

"Hey, look who decided to show up on time," he said with a grin, "Hope ya brought your sword and shield, Touzoku."

"That bad, huh?" Bakura said dully.

"Yeah, the kid ain't lookin' so hot. I'm pissed, man, I would've paid good money to see the state he must've been in last night. He must have been completely _wasted._"

"Probably..." Bakura said with a shrug, not really paying much attention.

"I mean, the worst must be over by now, but if he's _still _feeling crappy...seriously, how many units of alcohol would that take...?"

Bakura opened his mouth to ask exactly where the hell-child was, but just then the door to the staff toilet creaked open and Ryou made his first appearance of the night. It wasn't exactly a grand entrance.

"Hate to break it to you, man," Kazuma said with a chuckle, "But you still look like crap."

"Yeah, thanks," Ryou muttered, rubbing at his eyes as if this would somehow make the dark circles beneath them disappear. His face was pallid and his expression slightly zombie-ish. If his damp bangs were any indication, he'd just finished trying to revive himself by splashing water on his face. As Kazuma had said, he was probably at the stage where the hangover was wearing off...but the tiredness was just kicking in. And that was likely to make him even _more _crabby.

It seemed to take him a moment to notice Bakura's presence. He fixed his yami with a tired, half-lidded glower, as if inwardly debating whether he really had the strength to deal out sufficient punishment tonight.

"...I brought your shoe," Bakura said lamely, holding out the plastic bag Malik had pushed upon him when he left the apartment, "Malik had it."

Ryou blinked a few times as he processed this explanation. He looked mildly surprised that Bakura hadn't dumped the shoe in a dustbin on his way here.

"Oh," he said at length, reaching out hesitantly to take the bag, "Yeah, I brought his, too."

"Right," Bakura replied queasily, inwardly wishing for this 'conversation' to end. He kind of regretted ever starting it. The shoe could have waited until they were going home. Now he'd just put himself in the line of fire.

"Ry-ou," Mio piped up suddenly, "You're supposed to say 'thank you'."

Silence swooped over the room, and they all seemed to freeze comically (except Mio, who carried right on playing with her toys). Then Kazuma stuffed a fist in his mouth, to suppress either a whimper of fear or a bark of laughter.

Bakura could have taken his knife out of his pocket and carved the tension into novelty candle-holders. There had never been a moment this awkward. Ever. In the history of the world. It was going to kill them all if it carried on much longer.

"...Thanks," Ryou said finally, going slightly red with embarrassment or quiet anger – or possibly a nice combination of both. Nevertheless, Bakura's jaw dropped slightly as his light hurriedly turned away to put the shoe in the cloakroom until it was time to leave.

"...Woooah," Kazuma crowed once he assumed Ryou was out of ear-shot, "For a minute there, I thought we were all goners."

"I thought so too," Bakura said flatly, closing his mouth before anyone noticed him gaping.

"I dunno, man..." Kazuma said with another grin, "I don't know if I'd call that 'progress', but I wouldn't call it a step backwards, either."

"I guess..." Bakura said dubiously, frowning in puzzlement.

* * *

Despite that little moment of 'almost-progress', Bakura was not remotely looking forward to the walk home ahead of him when Ryou's shift came to an end. The teen was in an utterly rotten mood for many reasons, which did include his lingering hangover and crippling weariness, but Bakura suspected it was mainly because Hideki hadn't shown up that night and Takeshi had. And just to top it all off, a very drunk, very lecherous old man had attempted to flirt with him and in the end had spilt a full pint of beer down his front. As a result, when clocking-off time rolled around, Ryou was tired, irritated, slightly sticky and most likely looking for any excuse to bite Bakura's head off. The yami braced himself inwardly as the teen put on his useless jacket and gave him a curt nod, indicating that he was ready to go. They didn't speak as Bakura pushed the staff door open.

For the briefest of times, they both just stared out at the street before them, their faces blank with astonishment as they momentarily forgot to be annoyed or irritable or hateful.

It had been snowing. There must have been a proper blizzard while they had been inside, oblivious, cut off from the outside world by bricks and tinted glass. But whatever storm there had been had stopped now and the world lay quiet and still, covered in a thick layer of fresh snow. Pure and white. Even though it was still just South Domino, it was beautiful.

The rapture only lasted for that moment, though. An icy breeze gusted at them, breaking the spell. Ryou's sour expression slid back into place and, upon noticing that transition, Bakura raised his own guard again, hardening his demeanour. It bothered him how much Ryou's face had changed just there. For those few seconds, when he had just stared, enchanted by the sparkling whiteness like a young child, he had been so…so…

So like the old Ryou. The one who made that face of simple rapture so often. Bakura realised that, if he had ever appreciated that innocence, that face, he would miss it now.

He snapped out of his thoughts as a flurry of snow flew into his face. Blinking, he saw with disquiet that Ryou had savagely kicked the snow just in front of his feet, sending it up in the air and drifting back down on their heads.

"I hate the cold," the teen muttered.

"Kicking the snow won't make it warmer," Bakura pointed out dryly, brushing a few flakes out of his hair and off his coat. Ryou scowled.

"Maybe I hate the snow too," he said snappishly, stepping out onto the street and making as many footprints as he could in the unbroken surface of the new snow. The perfection of it all around him seemed to grate on him – he dragged his feet through it and kicked it, creating deep furrows and scars in the smooth whiteness. Bakura shook his head in disbelief. So childish, so desperate and angry and irrational…

He stepped forward and grabbed the teen by the shoulders, pulling him back into the doorway. Ryou glared and tried to push him away, but Bakura wrapped his stronger arms firmly around him, keeping him still. Ryou halted mid-struggle, leaving Bakura with his icy fingers against his shoulders and the side of his neck.

"Stop it," the yami muttered darkly, his look making clear his annoyance.

"Why?" Ryou demanded with a cold smile, "It won't stay perfect anyway. Nothing does. We'll walk through it and make marks."

"You did more than you needed to," Bakura said lowly, looking at the churned-up area of snow, "Look. You ruined it."

Ryou faltered. He swallowed hard and looked away.

"Is that what you wanted? Did you want to spoil it so you could feel bad about it?" Bakura asked irritably, "Don't bother. It doesn't suit you. That's like something _I _would do."

Ryou frowned at him uncertainly. Their eyes met, and Bakura knew not to say anything further – because Ryou didn't want to know what he meant. It was obvious that he half-understood (maybe, just maybe), and it was scaring him.

"Let me go," the teen mumbled, pushing half-heartedly with his chilled hands.

"You're shivering," Bakura told him with slight amusement, "And your fingers are freezing."

Ryou's face flushed and he snatched his hands away so that they no longer made contact with his yami's skin. In a strange way he missed their cold presence immediately.

"Isn't it a little warmer like this?" Bakura asked innocently, tightening his hold slightly. Ryou's cheeks flamed red with an entertaining combination of embarrassment and outrage.

"…Let me go," he repeated finally when it became clear that his darkness really was just going to wait for him to reply. Bakura chuckled lowly.

"Don't hate the snow," he said quietly in the teen's ear, "It can't help being cold."

He released his light without further warning, and Ryou fell back slightly with the shock of actually being obeyed. Bakura smirked to himself. It would have been interesting to test the boundaries – see how long Ryou would stand for him holding him. But in the end it had been better to let him go without a fight. This could be one incident they could look back on and remember that he had listened, and Ryou hadn't needed to get mad and kick him in the shins.

They walked to Ryou's apartment in a strange, restrained silence. The world seemed more silent around them too, blanketed in its soft white carpet that absorbed every sound. Their breath clouded in the air around them like plumes of silvery smoke.

Ryou walked on tip-toe the whole way, looking back at the damage they had done to the unbroken snow with regret. Bakura looked at him when he wasn't watching and felt the same way.

* * *

_**Praised be, it's done.**_

_**I love you, drunk!Malik xD Though there were parts where he seemed more like he was on something than just drunk. At least he's a happy drunk. The shoe thing was random, though.**_

_**Mio is quite fun to write. I love it when kids drag adults into their games and they don't know what to do about it. It's not like Bakura refused to take his 'medicine' because he's just that much of a meanie (though he is), he just doesn't get why taking two Tic-Tacs and pretending they're medicine would make a kid happy. I'm trying really hard to make Mio a 'normal' kid, though. It really bugs me when the children in stories are super-intuitive and basically smarter than the adults.**_

_**Big sugar-frosted thank you's to pride1289, KATZUNITED-MEOW-, KrystalMountain, crazyhikari, Enjeru, ACE329, Echoe'sFolly, Seto K4iba1, Teddy. syn , SingingWrenn, The One Called Demetra, schoolkid, Triva, chibi heishi, lovenyami, Snap Change, BakushippingxForever, HikariNoSage, ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry bomb, bbb136, Bokmal14, Junki, Calm Envy, Schizo-of-Destiny, MarikuOC, MagnusSpark, haku fan1, ani, Tender Loving Care, PurpleRanchDressing0987, DevianYUE, Pork Steak the Grande, I Dance The Tango, AmaneBakura1, Ceilo, melisse, iLoli, KuroAngelique, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, snake and crane, AliceCambio, Affy-Bakura, earthluva, -KnifeGoesDown-, iheartyaoibakura, Loss-of-SaNiiTee, Miyuuki-chan, IceDragon1095, bansheegrrl, Shantih, Tootchy, BlueSpiritFire1, GoodAndPl3nty, echochaos, yaoilovergirl and The-Elaboration . You are all my ray of sunshine in the perpetual rain of British summertime. **_

_**I'm happier with this chapter than I was with the last one, but I'm aware that it's still pretty much 'filler'. But AAAAH I'm so excited for chapter 19. Because STUFF ACTUALLY HAPPENS OMG :D**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	19. Boiling Point

_**Chapter 19: Boiling Point**_

New Year's was a fairly lacklustre affair for most. In fact, Bakura barely noticed the celebrations going on since, rather than taking any time off for the event, Ryou was pulling extra shifts at the Lot to accommodate all the party-goers, which meant that Bakura was pulling extra shifts too, whether he liked it or not. (This, naturally, caused the phrase 'no rest for the wicked' to be thrown around quite generously, by both Malik and Kazuma.) Midnight came and went while they were both caught up in the midst of the blaring music and drunken cheering of the club. Ryou would probably have ignored the big moment entirely, had Hideki not shyly slipped an arm over his shoulders and wished him a happy new year. (In fact, if not for that, Bakura probably would have missed the moment too – but that sure caught his attention.) The two of them trudged home, exhausted, in the early hours of the morning, neither of them giving a thought to the newly-born year. Sitting up to watch the first sunrise was out of the question – club-workers and night-thieves had limited time-windows for sleep, and even they needed to sleep sometimes.

Malik fully expected to spend the night alone, browsing various Christmas specials on the TV and maybe watching some fireworks from his window when midnight rolled around. However, these enthralling plans were quashed when Jounouchi showed up with a grin and a twelve-pack of beers. Malik asked him why he wasn't with his own family, and Jou said that Shizuka was out of town, and he couldn't care less about his parents. Malik asked him why he wasn't with Seto, then, and Jou told him to shut up. The beers disappeared pretty quickly. Malik then spent the remainder of the night debating whether to call his siblings at midnight his time or midnight their time, and in the end did neither.

Yuugi and Atemu had a fairly peaceful and pleasant New Year's – Atemu had managed to avoid open confrontation with Malik for the past few weeks, and Yuugi assumed this to mean that things were improving between the two. Nothing could have been further from the truth, but since neither of them had any particular wish to discuss the matter, ignorance remained blissful as the first of January dawned.

The first few weeks of the brand-spanking New Year passed quite uneventfully. Things didn't seem to get much better between Ryou and Bakura, but they didn't seem to get worse either, and Malik supposed they'd all just have to be happy with that. Admittedly, the same could be said about his relationship with Atemu and Otogi, and he was having a harder time being happy about that.

However, on one unassuming Saturday towards the end of January, the period of inactivity (or, perhaps more accurately, the period of monotonously repetitive activity) came to an abrupt end.

* * *

Malik wasn't having such a great day at work.

He gave a quiet sigh as he collected a pricing gun from under the front counter of the Game Shop. He'd discovered an ever-so-slight problem with a rack of new puzzle games. A mere glance at the brightly-coloured boxes had been enough for him to notice that _something _was wrong, and a closer look had confirmed that every single item was incorrectly priced – and these shelves ran from floor to ceiling. He had a sneaking suspicion (one that he would never speak aloud) that Otogi had done it, on purpose, knowing that he would have to fix it the next day.

Malik knew Otogi had never liked him. It wasn't something he'd ever been particularly happy about, but it was a fact, and he sensed it was something that was beyond his power to alter. Still, since the merger of the two Game Shops, he and the green-eyed youth had managed to co-exist with relative peace – it had just been a matter of Sugoroku giving them as few coincident shifts as possible and never, ever sending them for their lunch-breaks together. It had been fine. They had been able to say a civil hello each day and interact on the shop floor as cordially as any colleagues would.

But then Pharaoh had come back.

Malik shook his head in annoyance as he started re-pricing all the games, crouching down to begin with the bottom shelf. He had promised himself that he wouldn't blame Atemu. How could the Pharaoh be expected to trust anything he said or did? He had spent the past three years earning the trust of everyone here (Otogi aside). It had taken time. He had needed to _show _that he was different now. The Pharaoh had not witnessed that transition. He had just fallen back into this world, and had no proof in his mind that anything – any_one _– had changed.

He still wasn't sure if Atemu had been looking for an excuse to suspect him. Maybe it looked that way. But things had seemed fine the first day he had come back…

He supposed he'd been negligible then. There had been other people around with whom Pharaoh had been really close – of course he wouldn't pay much attention to Malik. Atemu had only focused on him for the first time with the revelation that he knew Bakura's whereabouts. So they hadn't exactly gotten off to a good start.

Malik shook his head again. Psychology student or not, it was futile of him to try and discern any deep meaning behind Atemu's treatment of him. It was simple. The Pharaoh didn't trust him, because he'd once been unworthy of trust. And since his return to this world, Malik was very much aware that little of what Atemu had seen of him was likely to have induced any sort of belief in his honesty. That was it. At this point, there wasn't a lot he could do besides keep his head down and hope that this would pass over.

He hated it, though.

He bit down on his lip as he continued with his repetitive task. He _tried _to take it all with good grace. But whilst he wasn't half as dastardly as Atemu and Otogi seemed to believe, he knew he was no saint either. One furious voice in his head screamed that this wasn't fair, it wasn't fair at all, he'd been here nearly three years now and it wasn't his fault if people who'd been AWOL all that time wanted to show up now and treat him like an ex-convict. But he could ignore that anger. He could pretend he was above that. What he couldn't ignore was the misery that came with the idea that he just didn't belong here anymore. This place had always offered him security, and now he just felt...transient. Like he really had no place here at all. And it was tearing him up. Even when he was at home, smiling like he didn't have a care in the world, the same thought still constantly loomed up dark and oppressive at the back of his mind, the thought that he had to come back here without really _being _here, without really being _part _of here.

He shuddered. Sometimes, thinking about these things, he could almost (_almost) _feel that ominous grey fog, closing in on him-

_(Thatfoghe'dbeenrunningfromallthistime.)_

He'd lived in that place, where all the colours were sucked out of everything, where nothing mattered_, _where you were always _so _alone…

He didn't want to go back there.

_(That's enough, Malik, you __**hush right now-!**__)_

He realised he couldn't reach the puzzles on the next shelf. He ducked through the back and retrieved one of the step-ladders, only grateful that he didn't encounter any of his dear colleagues on the way.

He tried to turn his thoughts to other things, but quickly found that there was very little going on in his life that was likely to make him feel any less gloomy. College wasn't exactly inspiring. It was such a…_factual _place for him. Other students went to make friends and find love and all that triumph-of-the-human-spirit kind of stuff. He went to study. It was all he could do.

Then there was Ryou and Bakura. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, Bakura adamantly denied having any sort of protective or affectionate feelings towards his light – and Ryou just hated him. And he always _would _hate him, if Bakura didn't swallow his stupid pride and change his ways really soon. Saying he wanted to 'help' his other half wouldn't do any good unless he could find it in him to drop the I-could-really-care-less act he seemed to put on when they were actually face-to-face.

Malik groaned inwardly as he stepped onto the top step of the ladder in order to reach the highest shelf. He knew Bakura was changing, but sometimes he doubted whether he would ever change _enough_.

He sighed softly. His heart felt, quite literally, like a stone lodged in his chest.

_(And that was __**baaaaaaaad-**__)_

The Game Shop door swung open with its accompanying bell. From his place on the ladder, Malik had his back to the shop and so took this opportunity to try and adopt a more cheerful facial expression that would be more likely to appeal to a customer. A face that suggested imminent suicide was not conducive for sales. He heard a few tentative footsteps behind him, suggesting that the person had stopped somewhere near where he was. Maybe they needed help with something.

"Sorry, I'll be with you in just a second," he said, struggling to reach the last stupid wrongly-priced box.

"…Don't hurry. Omote."

With that voice, the world seemed to go very cold.

_No. Not here. Not now. No, please-_

Swallowing hard, Malik summoned up all his willpower and turned his head.

He knew what he would see, but the shock still ripped through him. He found himself looking straight into those deep violet eyes, those eyes that were his nightmare-

"N-…"

Mariku looked up at him with an unreadable expression on his angular face, and Malik just couldn't understand it because that wasn't _his _face, but his darkness had always been a part of him so how the hell could he have a face that was nothing like his face…?

Bakura's words ran through his panicking brain like a stuck record. _He won't hurt you. Don't you get it? He won't hurt you. Won't hurt you. Won't hurt…_

But Bakura wasn't here. He was all alone. Oh God, oh _God…_

Mariku took another step towards him. Malik opened his mouth as if to scream, but there was no sound. It was like some ridiculous silent movie. He could move, though. He'd expected to be paralysed as well as insensible, but he could move. But he was also on a ladder. Somewhere in the midst of the past few seconds, he'd forgotten about the ladder. He only remembered about it when he suddenly lost his balance and found himself plummeting to earth. He landed in an awkward half-crouched position, and a sizzling pain shot up his left leg but he barely noticed. All he could see were those eyes, looking down at him now, and he wanted to scream, he didn't want to be alone, he wanted to cry out like a child for _anyone_…

_Isis Rishid Yuugi Ryou Jou Bakura?_

_Save me please save me someone please help me oh God __**please-!**_

"Omote…" Mariku said lowly, extending a hand towards him.

_No._

Malik still couldn't make a sound. He threw himself backward desperately, anything to get away, put some distance between them…

The ladder had half-tipped over when he fell, and as he scrabbled backwards he managed to kick it by accident. It gave an unhealthy lurch before crashing down on top of him, bringing a pile of puzzle boxes down at the same time. The ladder landed on his legs, intensifying the new pain in his left ankle, and he raised his arms to protect his head as the boxes clattered down one by one.

He heard the shop door open and close again.

When he opened his eyes, Mariku was gone.

Malik blinked slowly. All he could hear was his own breathing, and his heartbeat pounding in his ears.

He slowly pushed the ladder off of him to free his injured leg, but he didn't stand up. He wasn't sure if he could. He just sat there, staring blankly at the floor.

_Did that really just happen…?_

He started as a shadow fell over him. Dread gripped his heart as he looked up, only to find it was Otogi, looking down at him with folded arms and a bemused expression. Malik had never been so glad to see him. He opened his mouth to explain what had happened, but the words died in his throat when the green-eyed youth's mouth curled into a dry smirk.

"Aren't you posing a bit of a tripping hazard down there?" he sneered, putting just enough malice into his tone for Malik to know the joke was on him. Then he walked away.

Malik's eyes smarted painfully. He knew two things for certain.

One: he wasn't safe here anymore.

And two: he didn't belong here anymore.

So what was he still doing here?

Mariku knew he was here. Mariku could come back at any time…!

Malik didn't care about the pain in his leg. He got to his feet, and he ran.

* * *

"_Let me out. Please, let me out…someone, please…"_

_My 'throat' hurt from saying that so many times. My voice had been reduced to nothing more than a croak from the constant repetition, the constant pleading, begging…_

_No one was listening._

_I fell silent, finally accepting that grim fact. No one could hear me. No one was going to help me._

_I shivered involuntarily. _

_I sank to the floor (floor? Ground? What was it?) and stared listlessly at where there should have been a door but there wasn't a door. I wondered if anyone had even __noticed__ my absence yet. That should have been a given, but it wasn't. Before (when I was an even bigger idiot) I had been so sure that Yuugi and the others knew me well enough to instantly see through the mask (__**my face**__) that Bakura wore. But they didn't. They didn't know me at all. Maybe they thought there was nothing to know. Bakura could tattoo 'EVIL' across my forehead (__**mine! **__Not his, __**mine**__!) and they still wouldn't notice any difference. My presence was like background noise to them. A sad prop in a shadowy corner of the stage. So when Bakura took over…all that happened was that my background noise became a bit more distracting. A bit more noticeable._

_I bit back a laugh. Of course they wouldn't notice the difference between him and me. They only looked at 'me' when he was in control. He got their attention. Not me._

_They had each other. Their friendship (what did that word even mean?) was invincible. So what did they need me for?_

_Well, they didn't. Need me, that is. Obviously._

_But of course I knew that. Deep down, I always knew that._

_I drew in a sharp breath, a habit of mine even when I was nothing but spirit. I wondered how bad it was of me to hate them. _

_I smiled. A horrible, sickly smile, I knew. They didn't think I __**could **__hate. They didn't list that in my limited repertoire of functions. To them, I was just 'Ryou'. It was a name without much meaning. Like the name of an object. Table, chair, tree, ryou. Hah. That was better. Not Ryou. Just ryou. The thing that stands there with the stupid little smile and doesn't say a word._

_I swallowed hard but then remembered there was nothing to swallow. Not when I was spirit. When was I going to learn…?_

_I wondered when I started thinking of Yuugi and the others as 'them'. When did Bakura and I become 'us' and my friends become 'them'? When did they become my enemies as much as him…?_

_Maybe he made me hate them. Maybe he messed with my head. It wouldn't be the first time._

_Not that it mattered. If he tried to twist things, it worked. I can't stand them. I can't be with them without remembering that I'm not __**really **__with them. I can't look at them without wishing that they would just __**stop smiling, just go away and don't come back-!**_

_Huh. Wasn't that what Bakura wanted…?_

_I pulled my knees up to my chest forlornly, wrapping my arms around them. It probably had been him, twisting my thoughts and warping my mind all out of shape. But I didn't care anymore. What was the point? No one was going to notice if I disappeared. _

_Maybe it was that realisation that had made it so much easier for Bakura to lock me away. I raised my head again, but the door out of my soul-room was still absent. Just a blank wall. Seamless. Inescapable._

_I grimaced. A lot of people would probably kill to see the inside of their very soul. For me, it had just been one more in a long list of disappointments. Even my soul was unremarkable. Just a room. Small. Empty, except for piles and piles of closed boxes. The whole place smelt faintly of dust, like an old attic. I had never looked in the boxes, but I knew what was inside. Memories. Dreams. Fears. Everything. This was my soul-room, and my soul was packed up in boxes. Because that was what I did. I put things in boxes and tried to forget about them._

_It felt like I'd been in here forever. I dreaded to think what Bakura was doing. Somehow it always felt a million times worse when I was trapped in here and couldn't see what atrocities he was casually bringing about with that Ring._

_When did that happen, too? I never used to get sealed away inside my own soul. Bakura could always evict me from my body, but I used to simply float along beside him – a helpless and hopeless observer. But now he locked me away so easily, shoved me into this dark, musty box…_

_Well, I already answered that question. It was because I didn't care anymore. My soul was stronger before, when I felt I had a __**purpose**__, when there was a chirpy, morally-upstanding voice in my mind telling me I had to __**protect my friends. **__Now I had no friends. So I'd stopped fighting. I was sure it suited Bakura just wonderfully._

_I rubbed absently at my left arm. Even in caged-up spirit-form, it still throbbed distantly. I tried to keep the horrific thought at bay, but it swept over me like a tidal wave, still as terrifying and callous and unforgiving. __**He stabbed me. He took my own right hand and made it stab my own left arm.**_

_I wondered what would happen if my body died while I was trapped in here…?_

_My shoulders shook with the pathetic almost-crying I so often found myself doing in this situation. He stabbed me! With a knife! Maybe I locked __**myself**__ in here because I just couldn't deal with that._

_He wasn't alone, either. I frowned, thinking hard. That was unusual. From my experience (my nasty, nasty experience), Bakura worked alone. Why would he have found himself an ally now…?_

_But I was sure there had been someone. I remembered a boy. He wasn't familiar, but he didn't look much older than me. Blonde hair and fierce eyes. And he had the knife, the needle-sharp dagger Bakura slashed into my arm…_

_The dagger had a gold bulb on the end. With an Eye of Horus on it._

_I shut my eyes tiredly. A Millennium Item. Well, that sure explained a lot. Whoever that boy was, he should be careful. I knew better than anyone how much Bakura wanted those damned Items. _

_Enough to spill a whole lot of innocent blood to get them-_

* * *

Bakura was woken by the sound of the telephone. He groaned sleepily and sat up, realising he had dozed off on the sofa.

"Idiot…" he muttered, scratching the back of his head, "Of course you'll have weird dreams if you sleep at such weird times…"

He wondered how he knew that. It sounded like some kind of psychology thing. Malik had probably mentioned it at some point.

The phone continued to ring, persistent and irritating. He glared at it, willing it to shut up. He made a point of never answering it, just in case it was the Pharaoh or someone almost as nauseating. If he answered the phone to one of _them_, it was going to cause some _very _awkward questions to be tossed Malik's way.

He smirked wryly as he considered how protective he was becoming of the blonde Egyptian.

The incessant ringing finally gave way to Malik's chirpy answering machine message. Bakura got to his feet, still rubbing at his eyes blearily and considering the details of the unpleasant dream. He was grudgingly aware that it had been another 'Ryou-dream', as he had taken to calling the bizarre experiences. He hastily made an attempt to consider this one factually before the inevitable guilt-trip kicked in.

Ok, Ryou had been stuck in his soul room, which meant that it had happened _before _he and Pharaoh had their final showdown in the Memory World. (Bakura found himself mildly irked by the dreams' lack of proper chronology.) And he'd been thinking about Malik, but he hadn't _known _Malik, so...Battle City, right-?

Bakura froze and completely ceased to care about his dream when a considerably less chirpy voice crackled from the phone. His sleepiness was immediately gone – vanished like smoke on the wind – and he turned his head to look curiously at the talking device.

"_Bakura? Um…are you there? Please, pick up the phone…"_

It sounded like Malik. And yet, it didn't sound like Malik. It was faint and shaky, trembling and slightly thick-sounding. Bakura frowned uncertainly.

"_If you can hear me…__**please**_...**"**

That slightly desperate plead snapped him out of his pondering, and he hastily snatched up the phone.

"Malik?" he demanded, hoping his voice didn't sound as perturbed as he felt.

His only answer was a sound of intense relief, something between a laugh and a sob.

"Malik?" he said again, tone somewhat nervous now, but still demanding, "Why are you phoning your own house?"

"_Um…" _the thin voice said, _"You'll think I'm crazy, but…"_

"You are crazy," Bakura said bluntly, "It's one of your more endearing traits. Just tell me what's going on."

"…_I need you to come and get me."_

Bakura frowned at the phone as if unsure he had heard correctly.

"What?" he questioned.

"_Please…" _he heard Malik moan, and the fear in his voice was so intense that Bakura couldn't help but feel it too, _"Just…just come. Please."_

"Are you in trouble?" he asked, fighting to keep his voice calm.

"_No…I mean, I don't know…"_

Bakura forced down his annoyance and frustration.

"Where are you?" he asked finally. Malik managed to give him the street but, of course, he didn't know it.

"…_You know where the Game Shop is, right?" _Malik said.

"Of course."

"_Near there. Really near. It's, like…"_

"Whatever, I'll find it," Bakura told him, impatient to get moving. He'd just noticed that Malik's cell phone was lying on the nearby coffee table, meaning that he was phoning from a call-box. It shouldn't be too hard to find the nearest call-box to that stupid shop, "Don't move, got it? Stay exactly where you are."

Another laugh-sob.

"_I'm not going anywhere," _Malik assured him shakily before they both hung up.

* * *

"Hey…" Yuugi said, looking around dubiously as he came up behind Otogi in one of the stockrooms, "Do you know where Malik is?"

The green-eyed youth snorted.

"On the floor under a pile of jigsaw puzzles, last I saw," he replied, the ghost of a smirk playing on his lips.

"What?" Yuugi said, confused.

"He fell, I guess," Otogi told him with a dismissive wave of his hand, "Looked like he'd just come off the step-ladder."

"_What? _Was he ok?" Yuugi demanded, alarmed.

"I don't know, Yuugi," Otogi said with faint irritation, "Do you think I stopped to ask?"

"_Otogi_," the diminutive teen said in extreme disapproval, "That's just mean. I know you're not on the greatest terms with him right now, but…"

"I've _never _been on great terms with him, actually," the black-haired boy said shortly, raising an eyebrow when he saw Yuugi's shocked expression, "What, he never told you? Heh. Figures."

"I don't see what your problem is," Yuugi said in disbelief, "He's never caused _any _trouble since he started working here, not for you, not for anyone-"

"And what about before that?" Otogi snapped, "You're so naïve, Yuugi. I know it'd be nice to believe that people can just miraculously _reform, _but it just doesn't_ happen-_"

"Forget it," Yuugi said shortly, "I don't even want to talk about it. Do you know where he is now, or-?"

"He's gone," Sugoroku said abruptly, surprising them by suddenly entering the room. Despite their widely varying inner reactions to this information, both teens displayed identical expressions of astonishment for a stunned moment.

"What do you mean, he's gone?" Yuugi questioned apprehensively.

"I mean he left," his grandfather elaborated with a brusqueness that was not common to him, "He's gone and he won't be coming back, I expect."

"But…but _why_?" Yuugi asked, clearly aghast. Sugoroku shrugged grimly.

"I really don't know, Yuugi. Can you think of any reason at all why he wouldn't feel welcome here anymore?" he said, casting a meaningful glance at Otogi, who looked away, "I don't know the reason. He just came bursting into the staff-room a few minutes ago. The way he looked, I thought maybe he was going to be sick. But no, he grabbed his things and just about managed a 'thank you and goodbye' before running out again…" he paused and looked troubled, "Something seemed very wrong. He was…panicked."

"That's not…like him…" Yuugi said nervously before his expression darkened and he rounded on his colleague, "What happened, Otogi? What did you say to him?"

"Hey, I didn't do anything!" Otogi insisted, throwing up his hands, "I just heard a crash and when I went to look, he'd fallen off the ladder, ok?"

"And it sounds like you were _really _helpful," Yuugi said, folding his arms.

"He didn't look like he was in any kind of life-threatening condition," Otogi snapped, "He just looked kind of…shook up…" He trailed off.

"If you were any kind of person at all you would have at least helped him up!" Yuugi shouted, close to tears, "What's _wrong _with you and Atemu? If Malik does something to hurt you now, I wouldn't blame him!"

Otogi opened his mouth to respond, but Yuugi was already gone. Sugoroku left the room too, without a backward glance.

* * *

Atemu was surveying the scene of destruction near the front of the shop with raised eyebrows when Yuugi came storming in from one of the stockrooms.

"Hey…" the former Pharaoh said, not noticing his light's fuming expression, "I wonder what happened here, it's a mess…"

"Someone fell off a ladder," Yuugi said quietly, but in a tone so dangerous that Atemu immediately realised something was wrong. He also immediately realised what had happened.

"Oh, so that's what the crash was…" he mused, "Malik, I suppose? He should be more careful."

"Why am I not surprised that you don't care either?" Yuugi muttered.

"Hm? Is he badly hurt?" Atemu asked.

"I don't know, because he's gone," Yuugi informed him bluntly, "Are you happy now?"

"He left?" Atemu said, looking at least shocked if not saddened, "Honestly, isn't that a little _extreme_…?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that, while I am not _too _distressed at his departure, I think it was a little rash of him to walk out just because Mariku was here…" Atemu said with slight scorn. Yuugi went pale.

"Mariku came _here?_" he questioned in horror. His darkness looked at him with mild surprise.

"Didn't you know?" the Pharaoh enquired, "Just a little while ago…"

"Of course I didn't know! I thought Malik left because of you and Otogi!" Yuugi all but shrieked, "Mariku _actually _came here? You saw him?"

"Yes, I caught sight of him as he came in," Atemu said patiently, "I don't think he saw me, I didn't speak to him…"

To his considerable astonishment, Yuugi gave a yell of frustration.

"How could you?" his light demanded mournfully, "Do you have _any idea _how scared Malik is of him? How could you just let him wander in here?"

"I didn't think it was my place to interfere," Atemu said, only now becoming slightly defensive.

"And yet it's your place to interfere with Ryou's life?" Yuugi challenged, "That's garbage. You just didn't care! That's awful, Atemu, that's even worse than letting Bakura loose at Ryou…!"

The teen cut himself off with another angry cry and turned on his heel, heading straight for the door.

"Where are you going?" Atemu asked, clearly thoroughly unnerved by his light's uncharacteristic fury.

"To make sure Malik's ok," Yuugi snapped, "Since no one else cares."

He slammed the door behind him, leaving Atemu feeling more humbled than he'd ever care to admit.

* * *

Finding the nearest pay-phone to the Game Shop was proving slightly harder than anticipated.

Bakura growled lowly to himself as he stalked down yet another unfamiliar street, struggling to convince even himself that he wasn't just wandering aimlessly like a lost tourist. Gods. He hated to admit it, but he was worried. What the _hell _could have happened to shake Malik up like that…?

Suddenly he saw a phone-box further up the street. Hoping to any gods that were listening that it was the right one, he hurried towards it, all the while keeping his eyes peeled for the familiar head of sandy hair.

At first he thought he had the wrong place, because he couldn't see Malik anywhere. But as he neared the phone, starting to feel infuriatingly defeated, he caught sight of a figure crouched on the ground _inside_ the phone-box. He frowned questioningly as he approached, peering through the slightly scratched glass walls.

"You know…" he said stiffly as he opened the door, "If you're trying to hide, you might want to think about finding a box that _isn't _see-through."

Malik was sitting curled-up in the corner. He raised his head slowly at Bakura's voice. A spike of unease shot through the white-haired yami when he saw that bronze-skinned face was blank with fear. However, upon seeing him, Malik managed a small, shaky smile.

"You came?" he asked with a jittery laugh.

"Of course I came," Bakura said gruffly, bending down to look at him more closely, "What happened?"

Malik drew in a long, shaky breath and shook his head wretchedly.

"Just take me home," he said softly, "Please_, _just…let's go home…"

Bakura stared at him with worry and frustration for a lengthy moment before nodding reluctantly.

"Alright," he said, "Come on."

Feeling a little awkward, he offered the blonde-haired youth a hand, which he accepted unreservedly, though he winced in pain when Bakura tugged him to his feet.

"What's wrong?" the yami asked, trying to keep the concern, which was now nearly hysterical with not knowing anything, out of his voice.

"Nothing," Malik said immediately, "It's nothing. Let's go."

Bakura, like anyone with two eyes and a brain stem, could see that it was most definitely not nothing, but for the sake of Malik's very apparent fear he let it drop.

"Fine…" he said irritably, placing a hand in the centre of the blonde's back and giving him a slight push to start him walking, "But you have a lot of explaining to do once we get back."

Malik gave a small, miserable nod, not once raising his eyes from the pavement as they began to head in the direction of his apartment. Although he usually came across as so strong and unflappable, he seemed very small and fragile to Bakura in that moment, perhaps because the way he hung his head deducted a fair few inches from his height, and the uncharacteristic hunch of his shoulders shrunk him even further. Seeing him look so broken and defeated awakened a fierce kind of angry protectiveness in Bakura, who realised he'd grown a lot more attached to the blonde than he'd even been aware of previously. He didn't remove his hand from the Egyptian teen's back, and he didn't once complain about how close Malik walked to his side.

As they rounded the next corner, neither of them noticed the pair of large, surprised amethyst eyes watching them from further up the street.

* * *

When they got back to the apartment, the first thing Malik did was walk away from Bakura without a word, shut himself up in the bathroom and lock the door behind him.

Bakura stared after him in disbelief for a moment before growling lowly and crossing the floor to the locked door.

"Malik, don't you dare fuck around with me! Get out here!" he snarled as the unbearable anxiety and frustration swirled in his gut. He hammered heavily on the door, "What happened? You asked me to come and get you, so I came and got you. God_damnit, _you can't pull that kind of shit and then not even tell me what the hell is going on! How long are you planning on hiding in there, huh…?"

He trailed off when he heard the sound of violent retching. He winced. _Oops. _

"Oh, uh...ok, just...do what you've got to do, I guess," he said awkwardly, backing away from the door. He had absolutely _no _experience dealing with sick people (though he suspected Malik hadn't called him because he'd been feeling a bit queasy), "But you better come out of there soon."

Unfortunately, he didn't. Half an hour later the unpleasant sounds of vomiting had long ceased, but the door remained shut. The silence was almost eerie, broken only by Malik's breathing which, punctuated with coughs and hiccups, could occasionally be heard. Bakura didn't think he'd ever felt so horribly tense. He didn't understand that a great amount of distress came with a situation in which you were helpless to either comfort or assist a friend in need, but some part of his re-awakening human soul knew the feeling instinctively...and he _felt it._

He approached the closed door slowly, trying to ignore the unfamiliar and thoroughly abrasive sensation. Under normal circumstances he would complain about it to Malik and the blonde would explain it all away with calm and reason and, whilst this wasn't enough to make anything go away, it made most things make sense and therefore seem less frightening. Of course, the usual process was out of the question at the moment. Malik was clearly in no fit state to calm anyone else down. Bakura suddenly realised that, these days, it was almost unheard of for him to be the more level-headed of the two. Such was the current situation.

He pressed one palm against the wood of the door, narrowing his eyes and wondering if he could smash it off its hinges with one swift kick.

_And what good would that do, idiot? Do you really think that'll make him feel any better?_

He sighed heavily and lowered his head. He was utterly out of his comfort-zone, and he had no idea what to do.

"...It was him, wasn't it?" he said after a moment, keeping his voice as quiet and level as he could, "Mariku."

Malik's breathing seemed to stop for an extremely long moment.

"You saw him, right?" Bakura pressed on. Half an hour had been long enough for him to conclude that that was the only thing that could have scared Malik so badly, "And I guess he saw you...too..."

He trailed off when the lock clicked open. He quickly took a step backwards and the door swung open slowly. Malik still stood with his head bowed dejectedly, but Bakura could see his red-rimmed eyes looking at him, at least lucidly if not calmly.

"What-?" he started.

"My foot hurts," Malik said unhappily. Bakura blinked. He noticed that the blonde had taken off his shoes and socks and now stood in his bare feet with his left trouser-leg rolled up to his knee. His ankle was swollen in a way that was not remotely attractive.

"...No kidding," Bakura said, raising an eyebrow.

* * *

Yuugi returned to the Game Shop and went straight upstairs to his room. He wasn't overly surprising to find Atemu waiting for him there. The former Pharaoh was sitting on the edge of the bed, scrutinising a messy collage of photographs tacked on the nearby wall. He looked up with an almost guilty expression when Yuugi shut the door behind him and cleared his throat.

"Aibou..." Atemu started.

"What?" Yuugi said unhappily, folding his arms and leaning against a bare patch of wall next to the photos, "What is it?"

"I'm sorry," Atemu said quietly, looking away awkwardly, "I didn't mean to upset you."

Yuugi bit back a groan.

"It's not always about me, you know," he said, "I'm not the one who needs an apology."

"That doesn't mean that Malik deserves one," the Pharaoh said stiffly.

"You knew I meant Malik, though," Yuugi said, "That's funny."

Atemu didn't reply and didn't look at him. Yuugi sighed and let his gaze wander idly over the nearby photographs. Malik (who probably didn't want an apology but should have got one anyway) wasn't in many of them, and he had his head subtly turned away in most of the few where he was in shot. He wasn't really a pose-and-grin person, which seemed to surprise a lot of people. There were only two pictures where the camera had managed to snap him properly; the first Yuugi recognised as the party they'd thrown when the two Game Shops had merged. Malik hadn't been working with him for long then – he'd been reluctant to come to the party, Yuugi remembered. He'd been strange and shy. Not the boy from Battle City.

It was a group photograph. Anzu wasn't in it so Yuugi supposed she must have taken it – he couldn't remember exactly, but she wasn't the type to miss a photograph. They – himself, his grandpa, Jounouchi, Honda and Otogi – were all sitting crammed together on a sofa, flashing wide, _say-cheese _smiles. Malik was sitting at the edge, sandwiched between Jou and the arm of the sofa. He looked as though the photo had taken him rather by surprise. His eyes were tinted red from the camera flash, and he wasn't smiling. He looked like he was staring straight out of the picture, silently pleading _Get me out of here._

The second photo had been taken at Yuugi's nineteenth birthday back in June. It was the only picture that he could see where Malik appeared to have seen the camera and didn't look bothered by it. It was another group shot: Yuugi in the middle (he was, after all, the birthday boy), Anzu, Honda and Otogi on his left and Jounouchi and Malik to his right. Everyone was smiling.

Yuugi realised Atemu was looking at the same photo.

"I love that picture," Yuugi said with a smile, "I remember it was one of those moments when the whole world just seems awesome."

"...Ryou isn't in any of these," Atemu remarked finally. Yuugi shrugged.

"They're all pretty recent. Y'know, past few years or so. He hasn't been around."

"Why isn't he in the graduation photo?" Atemu asked bemusedly, indicating to the picture of them all in their goofy hats and gowns.

"Because...he didn't graduate," Yuugi said with another helpless shrug.

"He didn't? Why not?" Atemu asked in bewilderment.

"I told you before," Yuugi said with a frown, "He was really sick."

Atemu looked at him with a questioning frown, clearly waiting for him to elaborate. Yuugi sighed heavily.

"I'm not talking about Ryou right now," he said, "I don't understand why you want to help him so badly, but you don't care about Malik at all."

"Malik doesn't _need _help," Atemu said stiffly.

Yuugi lowered his eyes and frowned, obviously irked by his yami's stubbornness.

"It's not fair on him," he said at length, "Because even though he doesn't do anything, he brings out the worst in you."

"What?" Atemu questioned, appearing aghast.

"I don't like to think about Kul Elna any more than you do," Yuugi said despondently, fiddling with a loose thread on his sleeve and not taking his eyes off it, "It's hard to feel like a good guy when you've fought someone who went through _that_. But that time, when Malik challenged you about it, it sounded like you were...defending it."

Atemu looked away immediately, a reddish tinge warming the skin of his face.

"Do you really think that it was ok because those people were 'evil'?" Yuugi asked almost pleadingly, "Or because it was to save everyone else?"

"Of course I don't," Atemu replied shortly.

"Then why did you say those things?" Yuugi asked. He'd lost interest in the dangling thread and was trying to catch his yami's eye, but to no avail.

"Because..." Atemu muttered, "I couldn't stand to tell Malik that he was right and I was wrong. I did what I had to do, but that doesn't make it right. I could never admit something like that to him."

There was a pause.

"I think you just don't like him," Yuugi said finally.

Atemu raised an eyebrow at him, as if saying he thought that was pretty self-evident.

"Not the way you're thinking of. You _know, _don't you? You know that he isn't up to anything, you know he doesn't want to hurt us. You just don't like him."

Atemu stared, apparently having never considered this possibility. Yuugi sighed again.

"The types of battles we used to fight are over now," he said, "This is the real world. Things are different here, there aren't just 'friends' and 'enemies'. You can't expect to like _everyone_. It's _ok _if you don't like him. Maybe you and Malik just aren't meant to get along..." he took a deep breath, "But that doesn't mean you can just hurt him. I mean, he worked here for years, and he was happy. Now he probably won't come back. You should feel bad about that."

His yami had a look on his face that suggested he'd _really rather not _feel bad about it. Yuugi felt that it might be more productive to talk to his bedside lamp.

"You're impossible," he grumbled, flopping backwards onto the bed and frowning at the ceiling, "But you're crazy if you still try and 'help' Ryou after this. If he finds out, he'll punch you into the sun."

Atemu didn't reply to that – it seemed that he knew it was true.

Yuugi's frown gradually faded as he drew his thoughts away from his unreasonable yami and towards the unexpected thing he'd witnessed when he'd gone looking for Malik.

"What about Bakura?" he asked suddenly.

"...What about him?" Atemu replied, nonplussed.

"Do you really think he's 'up to something'?" Yuugi elaborated, "Is that really why you want to know where he is?"

"Bakura will always need keeping an eye on," Atemu said stiffly.

Yuugi mulled this over for a few moments. If Bakura needed keeping an eye on, what for? To make sure he didn't commit any random and senseless acts of evil or, unthinkably, hurt his oh-so-delicate lighter half? Or just to see if there was _anything _that could be done to make up for that crime that could never be undone...?

"You don't hate him as much as you say, do you?" Yuugi said finally.

Atemu snorted dryly.

"I don't think I hate him half as much as I'd like to these days," he said, shaking his head ruefully, as if baffled by this. Despite everything, Yuugi couldn't help but smile.

* * *

_**That took a lot longer than it should have, considering most of it was written already...it was the Yuugi & Atemu scene that caused the hold-up. They're just not as interesting as the other mains. Still, when Yuugi threw his little hissy-fit at Atemu and stormed out, I think that may have been his crowning moment of awesome.**_

_**And see, I didn't lie, stuff did happen! Kind of...sort of...nearly. Malik and Mariku finally had their big reunion, but sadly for Mariku it was made of suck. I'm not sure if it's the meeting everyone imagined, but there it is xD How else was it going to go down, really? Anyway, more on that next chapter.**_

_**Hu-YOOGE thank you's go out to bbb136, BattleGoddess126, Junki, Echoe'sFolly, schoolkid, teddy-syn, Camille, YAMI'S BIGGEST FANGIRL, Bakura's Guardian Angel, chibi heishi, Epouvantable, GoodAndPl3nty, Out-Of-Control-Authoress, DevianYUE, MagnusSparks, Tender Loving Care, j bear, Affy-Bakura, ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry bomb, ani, Kurai, Bokmal14, KATZUNITED-MEOW-, LadyBlackwell, Seto K4iba1, Tenshi no Toki, Harutemu, SheepAteMyFamily, IceDragon1095, AliceCambio, SingingWrenn, echochaos, D, Pork Steak the Grande, earthluva, Schizo-of-Destiny, Enjeru, XionItachi, pride1289, BakushippingxForever, A Soul Alone, Mizuky6200, subaru1999, Shantih, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, HikariNoSage, lovenyami, crazy hikari, SheepAteMyFanboys, Calm Envy, bansheegrrl, nyeh, haku fan1, Airyballoon and Twilight-Imp-626. I love you all like a fat man loves his pudding :]**_

_**And an extra-special thank you to ACE329, who left me a super-long and awesome review. That one really made my day :)**_

_**A big chunk of Chapter 20 has been written already too, so hopefully I won't keep you waiting too long~**_

_**Fiver x**_


	20. Random Acts of Kindness

_**Chapter 20: Random Acts of Kindness**_

The Angels' Lot kitchen seemed oddly quiet and empty. Ryou felt like every movement he made was causing the whole room to echo and reverberate.

He glanced at his watch. Bakura often wandered in a few minutes late (or maybe it was just that he himself was always here a few minutes early in his neurotic punctuality), but he'd never been _this_ late before. It was weird. Maybe he'd finally given up on hanging around him like some extremely blatant stalker.

...Somehow he doubted that, though.

He jumped when Kazuma's phone started ringing. The older man didn't usually come in during the day at weekends, but there was a big drinks delivery coming in today and his assistance was required – mainly to make sure that no one unpacking said delivery was helping themselves to a bottle or twenty. He glanced at the luminous screen, raised his eyebrows and put the phone to his ear.

"Touzoku!" he said with a grin. Ryou blinked – speak of the devil, "Never thought I'd see the day when you'd actually call me. Does this mean we can go drinking together now, hang out, do manly stuff?"

Ryou couldn't hear his yami's reply, but he was pretty certain that it was a stern rebuke.

"Yeah, whatever, man. One day," Kazuma said, chuckling to himself. Teasing Bakura was quickly becoming one of his favourite past-times, which made Ryou wonder why his soul was still safely inside his body, "So what's up?"

Ryou fixed his gaze on the vat of soup he was re-heating and did his best to look as though he _really wasn't _trying to make out the distant, garbled static of whatever Bakura was saying. Unfortunately, his sonic hearing seemed to be non-functional today.

"_Oooh_," Kazuma exclaimed with mock horror after a moment, "Ryou, your body-guard says he's not comin' in today."

"You say that as if I would care," Ryou replied blandly. He still didn't look up from the soup, but only with something of an effort.

"I think he's bunking off, Ryou. He sure doesn't sound sick..." Kazuma trailed off as another burst of static erupted from the phone, "Oh, sorry, his _flat-mate _is sick. That's a new one, man, I have to-"

"Wait, what?" Ryou interjected with alarm, abandoning the bubbling soup and holding out his hand for the phone, "Gimme that."

Kazuma, startled out of his good humour, handed it to him without a word. He looked slightly nervous. Ryou supposed he must have got that thundery look in his eyes.

"Is something wrong with Malik?" he demanded, not bothering with formalities.

There was a short silence.

"_...Ryou?" _

He started without knowing why. Then he realised – he didn't think he'd ever heard Bakura use his name before. It sounded strange. As if they were familiar.

(He supposed that, for all intents and purposes, they _were _familiar – just not willingly. But it still sounded, and felt, odd.)

"_Ok, no. Seriously. Not now."_

Ryou blinked at this unexpected response before frowning and pursuing his line of interrogation.

"What did you do?" he repeated in a tone that spoke of approaching danger.

"_What did __**I **__do?" _Bakura hissed right back at him, _"Look, I know it's __**hard **__for you to understand, but not everything that goes wrong in the world is my damn fault-!"_

"No, just everything that goes wrong in _my _world," Ryou snapped, "Is Malik ok? Are you just making stuff up to get out of coming here? Because you really don't have to do that. Just don't come."

"_You are such a...urgh, I said I'm not doing this right now!" _Bakura snapped, _"Get off the phone, it's not even yours-!"_

"Put Malik on the phone."

"_No."_

"I want to talk to him!"

"_Not now, damnit!" _Bakura hissed lowly with barely suppressed impatience.

"Why, what's...?" Ryou started to ask before frowning, "Why are you whispering?"

"_..."_

Ryou glanced up at Kazuma, who shrugged.

"Does Malik not know you're calling?" he asked suspiciously – though what exactly he was suspicious of, he wasn't sure.

"_It's not like it's any of his business," _Bakura said haughtily, _"Anyway. I know it'll be difficult, but try not to die walking home yourself, ok?"_

"Shut up," Ryou growled, shoving the phone back into Kazuma's hands. Even when he wasn't here, Bakura really had a talent for putting him in a bad mood. He went back to the soup, stirring it just a little bit furiously and trying to put his darkness out of his mind completely.

"Hey, man, it's me again," Kazuma was saying with a quiet laugh, "Don't worry too much about missin' a day. Sure, it's a disgrace, but Ryou don't look so good today..."

"I'm fine," Ryou ground out for about the twentieth time since he'd started his shift, "I just had some trouble sleeping."

"...So he won't be working his full shift, anyway. An hour, tops."

"Two hours," Ryou interjected, "Two hours, at _least._"

"An hour and a half," Kazuma said decisively, "But you better get your ass back here soon, Touzoku, or he might just break his little heart-"

"Ok, not funny," Ryou said, brandishing his ladle threateningly (in the right light, the tomato soup could have passed for bloodstains and the action would have been distinctly more frightening), "Not funny _at all._"

Kazuma was spared a severe ladle-beating only because the nearby oven started to bleep. Ryou grabbed a dishtowel (there was a pair of oven-gloves somewhere – but they had a hole burnt through them) and wrapped it around his hand as he pulled out a tray of burgers from under the grill. Unfortunately the towel hadn't been designed with this purpose in mind – it slipped slightly and his thumb pressed briefly but painfully against the searing metal.

"_Oww, _shit," he hissed, automatically putting the burnt digit in his mouth even though he knew this would ultimately achieve nothing and he'd be better putting it under cold water, "This is turning out to be such a bad day."

His words were slightly muffled by the presence of his thumb, but Kazuma got his meaning.

"I thought Touzoku not showing up would make it a good day?" he questioned as he shoved his phone back into his pocket, a slight smile making the corners of his mouth twitch upwards.

"Yeah, yeah," Ryou grumbled, fanning his scalded hand in the air a few times before starting to throw the burgers into the waiting buns, "I should be grateful for small blessings, I guess."

He grabbed as many plates as he could and shouldered the kitchen doors open. One of the waitresses was waiting just outside, tapping her foot impatiently. Ryou wasn't sure whether to laugh at her or snap at her. It wasn't as if he was in control of how long things took to cook. She took the plates without a word and bustled off with them. Ryou suppressed the urge to pull a face at her and half-wished she'd trip in her ridiculously high heels. He settled for rolling his eyes and turned back towards the kitchen.

"Uh... Ryou?"

He blinked and looked over his shoulder at the tentative call and saw Hideki standing leaning against the bar (which was mainly for decoration at this time of day). He stared in dim surprise for a drawn-out moment. Hideki waved awkwardly.

"...Hey," Ryou managed to say finally, shaking himself out of his daze and approaching the bar with a smile, "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, that," Hideki said with a bashful laugh, pushing his glasses up his nose (Ryou was surprised to realise that he _knew_ that meant he was nervous), "You know, I was just in the area and..."

"In the area?" Ryou repeated with a raised eyebrow and a widened smile, "What were you doing around this place in the middle of the day?"

"Um...I was just on my lunch-break and..." Hideki was actually stuttering now, "I felt like taking a walk and..."

"You shouldn't take walks around here. Even in broad daylight, you'll get jumped," Ryou said, trying not to laugh and glancing (not critically) at the other's less-than-ripped physique.

"Yeah, well..." Hideki said with a weak laugh, "I was thinking of just going to Starbucks but...uh, y'know. The service there really _sucks_."

Ryou opened his mouth to say something along the lines of 'what difference does _that _make?' but then realised that had been a compliment. He was mortified to feel his face growing hot and, undoubtedly, turning pink.

"I hoped you'd be working today," Hideki admitted, "Don't think I've ever seen you in daylight before."

"It's not very flattering," Ryou said, suddenly very self-conscious of all the things Kazuma had unthinkingly said to him when he'd walked in today – '_woah, man, when did you last eat? Or see the sun? You look kind of dead', "_But hey, at least I don't turn into a pumpkin after midnight."

He winced inwardly. That had sounded less lame in his head.

"It's a nice change," Hideki said with a disarming smile, "And it's weird being here when it's so quiet. I mean, obviously there wouldn't be club music playing during the day, but...y'know," he laughed again, "It's nice to talk to you instead of yelling."

"Yeah," Ryou agreed. He sometimes wondered what working nights here was doing to his eardrums.

"Also..." Hideki went on, shifting his weight from foot to foot, "I thought it'd be less likely that...creep would be around during the day."

"...Which one?" Ryou asked with a blink. As far as he was aware, Hideki was the only customer he ever saw who _wasn't _a creep.

"Aw, you know..." he said with a shrug, looking away, "The one who's always _grabbing _at you. Blonde guy. Kind of scary-looking."

"Oh, you mean Takeshi," Ryou said, mouth twisting in distaste at the mere thought of the man, "He's not scary. He's just pathetic."

"Takeshi, huh?"

"Takeshi Sato," Ryou said, "He's like some small-time crime lord or something."

"Sounds like someone you should stay away from."

"Chance would be a fine thing."

"He does seem to like you."

"Yeah, he says I'm his 'favourite'," Ryou said, shaking his head in revulsion, "Aren't I lucky?"

Hideki just smiled wanly.

"But he's not here just now," he said at length, "So I guess I have you to myself for a while."

Ryou bit back a laugh at that somewhat cheesy line, which was probably Hideki's attempt to sound bold.

He could feel himself blushing again, though.

* * *

"Cannot believe...you walked home on that..." Bakura said through gritted teeth as Malik draped a bag of frozen carrots over his injured ankle, which was currently propped up on a mountainous pile of textbooks while the teen sat on the sofa, "Honestly, how stupid can you be...?"

"Sorry," Malik said. He'd calmed down a lot over the past little while but Bakura suspected that was mainly due to delayed shock. His glazed lilac eyes seemed to support this theory.

"Don't apologise," Bakura growled, "Just...I don't know. Learn to complain, or something."

"Ok," Malik replied, though Bakura doubted he'd actually heard what he'd said. His voice had a faraway, dazed quality to it, and he wasn't looking at him. His hands were quivering slightly but he didn't seem aware of it.

"...Anyway, I'm the one who screwed up the most," Bakura muttered lowly, face burning, "So you _really _shouldn't apologise."

Malik blinked languidly.

"What do you mean?" he asked, "You came when I asked."

"I said I wouldn't let...him hurt you," Bakura said despondently. (He avoided saying the name, but even the word 'him' made Malik twitch slightly) "And I wasn't there."

"Of course you weren't there," Malik said, looking puzzled, "I was at work. Why would you have been there?"

"Whatever," Bakura grumbled. This logic did little to lighten his feeling of having failed spectacularly yet again, "I thought you'd be safe there, though. I mean, wouldn't the Pharaoh stop him?"

"Pharaoh hates me," Malik said shortly, his dream-like tone being invaded by the return of rising hysteria, "He wouldn't care. Jou spilled the beans on that one, remember?"

"That shit hasn't stopped?" Bakura said, narrowing his eyes.

"Of course it hasn't stopped. It'll never stop!" Malik said in a slightly high-pitched voice, "Pharaoh doesn't have to answer to anyone, so why would he ever change his mind?"

"Bastard," Bakura mumbled, "I know I shouldn't really lecture anyone about common decency, but..."

"I'm not going back there," Malik said abruptly, shaking his head, "I'll find another job. I can't go back there."

"Ok," Bakura said simply. He wasn't going to argue. He wouldn't go back to a place like that either.

Malik gave a small nod, as if satisfied that that decision was out of the way. His eyes came back into full focus, but only for a moment – almost immediately he slipped back into his faraway state, though he looked more thoughtful than before.

"...Hey, Bakura," he said suddenly, "I was wondering. What's your connection with Ryou like?"

The yami blinked at the seemingly random question.

"You asked me that before," he reminded the blonde, sitting down next to him once he was sure the make-shift ice pack wasn't going to slip off.

"I know. Can you give me a better answer this time?" Malik asked, dull irritation creeping into his tone.

"Why?"

"_Because_," he said agitatedly, "If I can work out how these 'connections' are supposed to work, maybe I can learn how to block mine, like Ryou does. I need to learn to do that. This can't happen again...never again..."

"Did he hurt you?" Bakura growled, "Was your ankle his fault?"

"...I fell," Malik said with a shrug, "When I saw him."

"Right..." Bakura said, deciding not to judge him for it, since it obviously hadn't been one of his prouder moments.

Malik gave a small shudder as he thought back to the brief encounter. He covered his face with his hands for a moment, as if trying to block out the memory.

"Yuugi and Pharaoh can hear each other's thoughts," he said abruptly, "They call it their 'mind-link'."

"So that's why you mentioned that before," Bakura said with a small nod, "No, I definitely can't hear Ryou's thoughts. Thankfully. I doubt they're very pleasant, especially when I'm around."

Malik made an attempt at a laugh but it was weak and shaky and overall rather pathetic.

"Is there anything?" he asked, "Apart from being able to find him."

"I don't think so..." Bakura said uncertainly, "Except..."

"Except?" Malik repeated with an encouraging nod.

Bakura paused. He still hadn't _quite _got around to forgiving Malik for withholding information about important events that had occurred during his three-year absence, though he suspected the blonde had, as usual, everyone's best interests at heart. After a few moments of indecision, however, he found he couldn't refuse the young Egyptian when he was looking so completely dejected.

"It's just..." he went on, looking away uncomfortably, "Since I got back, I've been having these...weird dreams."

Malik visibly deflated.

"Dreams?" he repeated, obviously not expecting much.

"It's hard to explain," Bakura muttered, "They're like memories, but they're not _mine_. When I'm dreaming, I'm not me. It's like I'm _him._ I see it all happen, and..._feel _it all, through Ryou's eyes."

He suddenly realised Malik was staring at him, and his eyes weren't so glassy anymore. He looked like he'd perked up again during the course of his explanation.

"That's how you knew about the bar we went to," Malik said slowly, "And all those things that Ryou would never have told you."

"Yeah," Bakura said stiffly, feeling distinctly less mysterious and Thief King-ish now that the secret was out.

"I see..." the blonde murmured, probably mostly to himself. Malik liked to think out loud, Bakura had come to learn, "That's...unexpected..."

"It's probably just a coincidence," Bakura said uneasily, "Just dreams."

He knew that wasn't the case, of course, but he always felt uncomfortable when Malik got that deeply thoughtful look on his face.

"Nothing with you two is ever coincidence," Malik said dismissively, "I'm just trying to think...Dreams. Isn't that sort of like a mind-link too? No, dreams are different, dreams are subconscious, dreams are..." he paused, "Some people say dreams are like your soul acting without your body. They're supposed to be very...spiritual."

"So me and Ryou have a...spirit-link?" Bakura said hesitantly.

"I guess. Other people might argue that there's no such thing as a 'soul', but we know better than that..."

All of a sudden, Malik seemed to freeze up, eyes wide. Bakura got a feeling that it had very little to do with the cold of the ice pack.

"But..." the blonde said slowly, "If Pharaoh and Yuugi's connection is in the 'mind'_, _and you and Ryou's is in the 'soul'_, _then that just leaves..."

There was an impossibly long, hideously drawn-out moment of tense silence.

"...The heart?" Bakura finished for him.

Malik looked like he might be sick again.

* * *

A few hours later, Ryou was walking quickly through the dark and ominous streets of South Domino (which always seemed dark, even during the day), keeping his head down. The walk home seemed strange and quiet without Bakura, just as his whole afternoon shift had. (Or the little of his shift that Kazuma had allowed him to work.) He didn't _miss _the Thief's presence – far from it – but he was perturbed that he had become so used to having him constantly at his shoulder that it now seemed odd to be without him.

Hideki hadn't been able to stay and talk for long – he hadn't been lying when he said he was on a lunch-break. Still, it had been...nice. And he couldn't help but think it was weird (in a nice sort of way) that someone would go to all that effort just to see him for a short while.

He had just reached the perpetually broken door to the apartment block when he became aware of that slightly familiar sensation of not being entirely alone. Having looked around and confirmed that there was no one within range of vision – at least, not anywhere he would _expect _anyone to be – he nibbled on his lower lip, wondering.

"Mariku?" he called out finally – half-suspiciously. He subconsciously backed up against the building so there could be no chance of the yami popping up behind him. As it happened, the sandy-blonde head popped out somewhere near his knee, causing him to jump out of his skin nonetheless. The yami was crouched just inside the doorway to the apartment building. Ryou wondered if he'd been waiting for him to come home, and if so, for how long. (He also briefly wondered how Mariku knew where he lived, but he found he wasn't all that surprised that he did.)

"…Hello," he said when he'd recovered from his shock and it had become clear that Mariku wasn't planning on starting any conversation.

"Hello," the yami returned lowly, fiddling with the hem of his deep purple cloak, still in his crouched stance, "…Isn't it a nice day?"

"It's cold," Ryou replied flatly. He wondered if that cloak was effective in keeping the other warm, "What brings you here?"

Mariku's sandy-blonde eyebrows crinkled into a frown at the question. His violet eyes were trained on the ground, but Ryou could see the anxiety and discomfort in his expression.

"You're the only one who sees me," the yami said at length, "This world is full of strangers. I didn't notice it at first. But…"

Ryou blinked, puzzled.

"Is something the matter?" he asked uncertainly.

Mariku glanced up at him awkwardly. Ryou was surprised by his eyes – he'd never seen them so close before. From what he knew of Malik's darkness, he'd fully expected those eyes to be frightening. The flat, predatory eyes of some jungle animal. But they weren't like that.

"I did a bad thing," the yami said finally, mouth twisting from side to side.

"…You did what?" Ryou asked apprehensively. He, naturally, hadn't witnessed Mariku's reign of terror during Battle City, but he'd heard stories – nasty ones. If the nomadic yami had done a 'bad thing' now, Ryou only hoped it hadn't involved psychological torture or bloodshed.

"I…" Mariku started hesitantly, "Omote. I went to see him."

"Oh," Ryou said, wincing. He could well imagine how that little reunion had gone, "That probably wasn't a good idea."

Mariku shook his head in sullen agreement.

"Why?" Ryou asked nervously when he didn't say anything more, "Didn't you say you wouldn't...?"

"But I _had _to," the yami said agitatedly, wringing his hands, "He was so sad. It was unbearable."

Ryou looked down at him, troubled and confused. He opened his mouth to ask for some explanation, but then an icy breeze gusted by, making him shiver.

"I think you need to explain some things to me," he said definitely, pushing the broken door back as far as it would go and slipping past the yami into the hallway, "But not out here. I hate the cold. You should come inside."

Mariku blinked up at him slowly before getting to his feet. Ryou was taken-aback by how tall he was up-close. A lot taller than him. Taller than Malik. How did that work? But then, of course, Bakura was taller than him, even though they'd once shared a body.

"You're sure?" the yami asked, tilting his head over to one side.

"About what?" Ryou questioned. Mariku gave a small and rueful smile.

"Haven't you been warned?" he said, "About me."

Ryou looked at him blankly for a moment before understanding.

"Oh. I've been told…things, of course," he said, shrugging.

"By omote?" Mariku asked quietly. Ryou looked away.

"No, not by Malik," he said softly, "I don't know everything. But I know…the things you did."

Mariku peered at him through the gloom, violet eyes slightly narrowed.

"Aren't you afraid?" he asked at length.

"…No," Ryou replied after a moment's consideration, "I probably should be, but…I don't know."

The bottom line was: he hadn't _seen_ anythingthat Mariku had done. So what if he'd heard about it? He hadn't seen it. He couldn't connect the deranged psychopath he'd been told about with the person before him now, who seemed, if not _normal_, at least mostly sane.

"Do you want to hurt me?" the white-haired teen asked abruptly. Mariku's smile widened slightly.

"No," he replied, seeming strangely glad to be able to give that answer.

"Alright, then," Ryou said conclusively, starting to lead the way up the stairs, "In that case we shouldn't have any problems."

He heard Mariku chuckle lowly behind him.

"Really?" the yami said, "Was it that simple with the Thief, too…?"

"What?" Ryou asked sharply, looking back at him.

"The Thief," Mariku repeated, "He's always with you, isn't he? Did you forgive him so easily too?"

"No," Ryou said shortly, unlocking his front door and pushing it open roughly, "I hate him."

"Hate?" Mariku repeated in surprise, sounding the word out slowly as if trying to remind himself of its meaning.

"Yes, hate," Ryou said impatiently, not wishing to discuss the matter, "Loathe, despise, detest. Dislike _intensely_."

"Because he hurt you?" Mariku questioned uncertainly.

"Not _just_ me," Ryou muttered, fumbling for the light-switch in his hallway, "That would be very self-centred."

Though he didn't see it, Mariku looked somewhat puzzled by his words, but seemed to let it go.

"You were alone just now," the yami said suddenly, "No Thief?"

"He didn't come today," Ryou said simply, "He said something about Malik being…sick…"

He trailed off and glanced suspiciously at his new house-guest, who hung his head slightly.

"That's a lie. Omote isn't sick. _Scared_ sick, maybe…" he muttered darkly before looking up again, "The Thief must have his hands full, with two lights to worry about."

"You think he's actually looking after Malik?" Ryou asked sceptically.

"Yes," Mariku said bluntly, looking somewhat sulky about the whole thing.

"…Right," Ryou replied, shaking his head and going into the kitchen.

"Isn't it funny?" Mariku wondered aloud, following, "It's like a trade. I'm here, the Thief is there. Is it funny or just stupid?"

"Are you talking to yourself?" Ryou asked, raising an eyebrow. The yami just grinned.

"But it _is _funny," he went on suddenly, "That you could forgive me so easily. You swept all the bad things away just now. Like they don't matter. Omote was the same with the Thief, I think. Why is it so easy when it's someone else's darkness?"

He sounded genuinely curious. Ryou shifted uncomfortably under his gaze – he hadn't felt so put on the spot since high school. It was that feeling you got when you were under the intense stare of a teacher who isn't going to move on until they get an answer.

"I don't know," he said finally, giving a small shrug, "Maybe it's just stupidity. Malik doesn't really know or understand Bakura, the same way as I don't properly know or understand you. Maybe if we did, we'd hate both of you."

Mariku thought about this.

"In that case," he said at length, "That 'stupidity' must be very precious."

Ryou blinked before shaking his head again and looking away.

"So what happened?" he asked abruptly, "When you went to see Malik."

"Oh," Mariku said, face immediately falling, "It was bad."

"I gathered."

"He got so scared," Mariku went on unhappily, "That he fell down."

"What?" Ryou gaped in alarm, assuming he meant that Malik had actually passed out with fright.

"He was on a ladder. He fell off."

"...Yeah, that sounds like a Malik sort of thing to do," Ryou said with a small nod.

"And now everything's just worse," Mariku said conclusively, looking thoroughly despondent, "Before, he was just sad and lonely. Now he's scared too. And hurt. It hurt so bad that I almost _felt _it. Normally it's just the _edge _of the feelings that I get, but..."

"What are you talking about?" Ryou asked in puzzlement, having totally lost track.

"Omote. He hurt himself. When he fell."

"No, I mean..." Ryou started uncertainly, "You're always saying things like that. Like...you know what Malik's thinking. Even when you can't see him."

"I don't know what he's _thinking_," Mariku said scornfully, "That's crazy."

"Then what?" Ryou questioned, determined to get to the bottom of this.

"I know what he feels," Mariku told him with a slight frown, as if this should have been common knowledge, "Isn't it the same with you and the Thief?"

"No," Ryou said, shaking his head, "No, people can't..."

He trailed off as it suddenly dawned on him.

"Oh..." he said, eyes widening, "That must be you and Malik's 'link'..."

"It's right here," Mariku said with his crooked grin, laying a hand over the left side of his chest.

"Then...that means..." Ryou said slowly, "All the 'connections' are different."

Mariku blinked, looking interested in this concept.

"Different? Then what does yours tell you about the Thief?" he asked, tilting his head over to one side.

"...Not a lot," Ryou said dubiously, "He can use it to find me unless I block it. I guess it would work the other way around too, if I ever wanted to find him...God forbid..."

"Stupid," Mariku snorted, "It wouldn't be a connection if it didn't help you find each other."

"Oh. They all do that?" Ryou questioned.

"I don't know," Mariku replied, looking surprised – as if he hadn't just suggested the idea.

Ryou folded his arms and worried at his lower lip, wracking his brains to think of something that would suggest the unfortunate connection he shared with his darker half was in any way unique.

It suddenly struck him with a kind of horrifying finality.

"No..." he murmured, shaking his head and biting on the end of his thumb anxiously.

"What? What?" Mariku questioned, doing his little head-tilt, to the opposite side this time.

"I..." Ryou started haltingly, "I've had a few...dreams. Dreams that aren't mine."

Mariku's face broke into a wide grin.

"You know the Thief's dreams?" he sniggered, his smile furtive and mischievous, "I bet he dreams about really _dirty things._"

"Not that kind of dream," Ryou said, rolling his eyes but smiling despite himself.

"Hm? Then what?"

"Like...I don't know..." Ryou said before shaking his head again, "No, it's probably nothing. It's nothing."

"Ok," Mariku said happily enough, "If you think that something's nothing, then that makes it nothing, right?"

"Huh?" Ryou said blankly.

"But my something isn't just nothing," the spirit said decisively, "It was difficult when I got back at first, though. I had to do a lot of watching and learning before I could understand anything that omote was feeling. At first I could only tell when he was...angry..."

He trailed off, looking at the floor awkwardly. Ryou frowned.

"Someone told me that, in Battle City...you were just anger and hate. Nothing else," he said slowly, "So is that true?"

"Yeah," Mariku said simply with a sad sort of smile.

"That's what Malik made you out of," Ryou said out loud as it all fell into place. There was a big difference between being a psychopathic human and being a creature created out of only rage and vengeance, "That's why he's so scared of you."

Mariku nodded, still looking sad and wistful.

"There's something omote doesn't know, though," he said.

"What's that?" Ryou asked.

"It's like a secret. And the secret is that he did more than he thinks he did," Mariku said, his explanation as concise as ever. Luckily for Ryou he decided to elaborate, "He took those bad things and he made a person out of them. He thinks he just made a monster, but..." he paused and frowned.

"I don't think you're a monster," Ryou said, surprising himself with his certainty.

"I think maybe I was before. But now I think I can be a person," Mariku said with a decisive nod, "And a person can learn. Even if they were created out of just bad things, they can learn to be something else. They can _choose._"

Ryou stared, speechless. Mariku grinned conspiratorially at him.

"I want to learn so many things," he said with an excited gleam in his violet eyes, "And be a 'complete' person instead of just a fragment," he trailed off and gave a small laugh, "You're so lucky that you were just born that way."

Ryou felt a surprisingly large lump in his throat. He had a sudden, strange urge to reach out to this almost-person, who'd probably never felt the touch of another human being, never been held. His right hand twitched slightly but in the end stayed at his side.

"Are you hungry?" he asked instead, "You are, right? I mean, where do you get food from when you're just floating around?"

Not waiting for an answer to either question, he started to search the cupboards for anything remotely edible. Something about Mariku's frank, candid way of speaking was making him oddly flustered – as if his own evasiveness and run-and-hide tendencies just couldn't stand up to that.

He really needed to go shopping. Once again, he was almost completely out of food. He vaguely remembered stashing a few packets of instant ramen on a high shelf somewhere. (He preferred to store them out of sight, out of mind, because he knew that, given the option, he'd probably just eat three-minute noodles for every meal.) He stretched up on his tiptoes, struggling to see if he was looking in the right cupboard. Sometimes he really resented the fact that he'd never managed to crack six feet. (Or even come particularly close.) And somehow, climbing on a chair to reach something on the top shelf seemed less demeaning when there wasn't another person in the kitchen.

A startled gasp jumped out of him when a pair of hands circled his waist and promptly lifted him a few inches off the ground, as if he weighed no more than a toddler. He looked down at Mariku, torn between mortified outrage and simple shock at his strength. The spirit grinned up at him without a word. Face burning, Ryou hastily reached into the cupboard and found the noodles, at which point Mariku set him back down on the floor.

"Uh, thanks," Ryou muttered, busying himself with filling the kettle, "But you could have just got them for me..."

"But I didn't know what you were looking for," Mariku said with a blink.

Ryou couldn't help it – he laughed. There was just no arguing with the yami's 'logic' sometimes.

* * *

"You know," Bakura said suddenly, breaking the heavy silence in the apartment, "If the Pharaoh is so convinced that you and I are plotting against him, I don't think it would be so wrong for us to prove him right."

Malik, who had spent the past few hours fretting over the nature of his and Mariku's connection and just what exactly it entailed, turned to him with a half-lidded, 'don't-make-me-hit-you' stare.

"Kidding," Bakura said with a faint smirk. The thought was vaguely appealing to him, but in all honesty he had very little interest in Atemu these days. He was kind of busy running around after two kooky lights to worry much about throwing himself back into a centuries-old stalemate that wasn't going to change anything anyway.

"Well, don't," Malik muttered, wincing as he shifted his position slightly and jostled his ankle. He'd melted at least three bags of frozen produce on it, but it was still somewhat swollen and clearly quite painful, "Y'know, I'm wondering if I could get away with just not mentioning this to Ryou at all."

"Why would you do that?" Bakura asked with a blink, only just managing to stop himself from saying that Ryou already knew _something _was up thanks to his sneaky phone-in earlier.

"Because if I bring it up, I'll have to explain everything..." Malik said slowly, "And then he might actually kill Atemu."

Bakura stared at him silently for a long moment.

"And I'm not kidding," Malik added.

"I kind of got the impression they weren't the best of friends," Bakura said uncertainly, "But..."

"Ryou _really _doesn't like him," Malik said with a nervous laugh, "I gathered that much when we were out that night."

"I wonder why..." Bakura said absently, "I mean, he didn't have a problem with him back before he got scary..."

"_Scary?_" Malik repeated, looking close to laughing for the first time that day.

"What? I didn't say _I _was scared of him, just that he is kind of...generally scary," Bakura said defensively.

"Uh huh," Malik said with amusement, "Ryou's a lot of things these days, but I wouldn't say he was scary."

"Yeah? That's probably because he doesn't want to _kill _you."

"Look on the bright side," Malik said, managing a smile, "Maybe you two can bond over your mutual dislike of the Pharaoh."

Bakura rolled his eyes and didn't reply.

Every time Ryou came up in their conversations, he kept wondering why he wasn't telling Malik that the white-haired teen was...fraternising with Mariku. It seemed a rather significant piece of information to omit, especially at a time like this. Sure, he knew that mentioning such a thing was likely to get a somewhat violent reaction from Malik and was guaranteed to send Ryou straight up shit creek without anything remotely resembling a paddle, but did he _really _care about that?

He remained silent. So, apparently, he did.

After a moment Malik's face lost its smile – as if the events of the day were creeping back into his mind, reminding him why he was sitting there with a sprained ankle instead of just finishing up at work.

"You ok?" Bakura asked without thinking. It took him only a split second to realise that that wasn't something he would normally say, but he was surprised to find he didn't really give a crap at present.

"Yeah..." Malik sighed, running a hand through his hair, "I just...I don't know what to do now. I mean, he's out there..."

"I don't think you can hide from him forever," Bakura said with a shrug. He knew it was the last thing Malik wanted to hear but he also knew it was the truth. If Mariku was going to keep hanging around like a bad smell, the two of them were going to have to confront each other eventually.

"...He doesn't look like me," Malik said after a tense pause. His expression made it clear that this had been preying on his mind for the last while, "He's...taller than me. Stronger-looking. And his face, it's...nothing like mine..."

"He never looked like you, though," Bakura pointed out.

"But he came out of my head," Malik said fretfully, "So how can he be...?"

"He's not you," Bakura said almost sternly, "He's just _not._"

* * *

"...You can eat that, you know," Ryou said while Mariku peered into his bowl of noodles with deep fascination, "It's not poisoned."

"I _know_," Mariku replied with a short laugh, apparently not picking up on Ryou's sarcasm, "You're not eating, though."

"Oh," Ryou said with a blink, unaware that the yami would wait on the basis of some kind of social etiquette. He looked down at his own bowl without enthusiasm, "I'm not really hungry."

"You _look _hungry."

"How can someone look hungry?" Ryou questioned in annoyance.

He'd managed to find a few non-withered vegetables in his fridge and had added them to the pot, making the ramen seem marginally more like real food and less like instant food. However, he just had no appetite. He hadn't eaten since breakfast, so he knewhe _should_ be hungry, but the thought of putting any kind of food in his mouth actually made him feel a little nauseous. He put it down to the tiredness.

Mariku started experimentally twirling noodles around his fork. For a bizarre moment Ryou wondered if he should have cut them up into shorter pieces, like when you were feeding a small child spaghetti.

"Anyway, I can eat whenever I want," he went on, "I doubt you're so lucky, since you seem to drift around like a ghost. So it's more important that you eat."

Mariku smiled across the table at him.

"You're very kind," he remarked. He said it in a voice so definite, so genuine, that it sounded as if he had decided this fact just now. Ryou felt his face grow hot at the sudden and (probably) unthinking compliment.

"I thought I was boring?" he muttered, trying to cover his embarrassment. Mariku's smile gained a mischievous edge.

"Can't you be both?" he said.

"I suppose so," Ryou said dryly.

Mariku seemed to get the hang of noodle-twirling pretty quickly, much to Ryou's relief. He wasn't sure he could have given someone almost a head taller than him a tutorial on using cutlery without laughing or tearing his hair out in frustration.

"Hey..." he said suddenly, "Earlier, you said you went to see Malik because he was...sad?"

"And lonely," Mariku affirmed.

"Why would he have been sad?" Ryou asked with a worried frown. Mariku shrugged.

"I don't know. Maybe you should ask him," he said. Ryou got the feeling that had been a not-so-subtle nudge.

"Do you think it's because of him?" he asked, thinking back to his yami's very suspicious phone-call that afternoon, "Bakura, I mean."

He added the name hastily, knowing that Mariku would bug him about it if he didn't.

"No," the yami said shortly, getting that sulky look on his face again.

"...You're that sure?" Ryou asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Uh huh," Mariku said with a gloomy nod, "The Thief makes omote want to punch things. He makes him forget he's lonely. Sometimes he makes him _smile_," he looked more put-out about this than anything else he had mentioned in the time Ryou had known him, "But he never makes him _that _kind of sad. He only feels like that when he goes to that place."

"Where?" Ryou asked, pushing the seemingly unthinkable information about his darkness to the side for the moment.

"That game shop."

Ryou's expression darkened immediately. He supposed that meant that Atemu _really _couldn't take a warning.

"What are you going to do now?" he asked. He'd plan a suitable punishment for the Pharaoh later, "About Malik."

"...I'll go back to hiding," Mariku said with a small shrug, "I know it won't make things any better, but at least it won't make things worse. For now it's all I can do."

"I guess..." Ryou said awkwardly, feeling surprisingly conflicted about who he should feel more sorry for.

"...I didn't mean for him to get hurt today," Mariku said, looking down at the table-top. Ryou didn't have any sort of supernatural connection to him, least of all one that transmitted emotions like a news feed, but he could see that the spirit was deeply miserable about the events of the day, "I really didn't. I knew I wouldn't be able to help, but..."

"But you just wanted to see him," Ryou finished quietly. Mariku nodded.

"Selfish," he muttered.

"It's ok," Ryou said uncertainly.

"I don't think so."

Ryou sighed heavily. The whole situation was just so screwed up. He knew that, as individuals, he, Bakura, Malik and now Mariku had enough issues to fill an Olympic swimming pool. He didn't delude himself that any of them, himself included, were particularly well-adjusted. Then when they were put into their respective light-and-dark pairs, the problems just increased ten-fold. Fear, hate, cruelty, madness. And now that it seemed all four of them were getting tangled together as they each wandered their own dark place, things were guaranteed only to get more complicated. The immediate future was looking pretty bleak from where he was sitting.

"I don't know if things will ever work themselves out," he sighed, "But don't think you've got to just hide away, all alone. If you ever feel like more instant noodles, you know where to find me."

"...Here?" Mariku questioned with a slight frown. Ryou laughed without even meaning to.

"Yeah, here."

* * *

_**Oh God, I'm officially in plot-point limbo now. I know all the important 'events' that will happen in this story and I know the order in which they occur, but damn, moving from one to the other is a pain. Chapter 21 is going to be a griiiiind. **_

_**So the dream thing finally came to light, hooray. Gotta love Malik and Mariku's wildly varying reactions to that information. 'Hmm I'm sure this is highly significant' vs. 'LOL NAUGHTY STUFF'. **_

_**Thank you's of Godzilla-like proportions go out to AliceCambio, DevianYUE, crazyhikari, Tender Loving Care, Junki, echochaos, Enjeru, schoolkid, Twilight-Imp-626, Charley Reede, Seto K4iba1, ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry bomb, melisse, YamiRisa, chibi heishi, Airyballoon, Empresss Spiral, SingingWrenn, pride1289, Triva, Bokmal14, ChosenEntity, Wilted Cherry Blossom, Aesop's Julie, I Dance The Tango, Shantih, lovenyami, nyeh, earthluva, Affy-Bakura, BakushippingxForever, bansheegrrl, IceDragon1095, Hotaru Layla, Offensivebunny, Calm Envy, Strawberry Ashes, KATZUNITED-MEOW-, Schizo-of-Destiny, looot, SHADOWoftheFOX, ACE329, scrawling purple ink, BattleGoddess126, BeckonBacon, GoodAndPl3nty, Random Reader, staidwaters, D Magic, haku fan1, sunokofairytale, Two Last Words, MissPessimist, EgyptianSoul.88, Tendershipper, safa'at keruth, FluffyGewitter, Kyrian, Kiara victory Tatsu and bbb136. If I could give you all hugs, I would :]**_

_**AND super-special thank you's to Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, mystralwind, and Lady Blackwell, who also took the time to read what turned out to be my complete failure of a one-shot in terms of popularity xD You guys got the love I need to see me through ;)**_

_**So er...see you all at Chapter 21...whenever that's going to appear ;-;**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x **_


	21. As The Dust Settles

_**Chapter 21: As The Dust Settles**_

Bakura was pretty disappointed in himself. After the night when Malik had hogged the sofa bed (which was forever branded onto his mind as 'drunk Malik night'), and the aching neck he'd suffered the next morning, he'd sworn never to fall asleep in any kind of uncomfortable sitting position again. But it seemed he'd gone and done just that.

It was probably highly insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but it worried him slightly. After all, he mused as he stood up and tried to get his body to move the way it was meant to without jarring like a rusty hinge, he was usually good at learning from his mistakes. When it came to his own comfort and self-preservation, anyway. As Thief King, he'd had to learn fast or die. So, yes, it disturbed him just a little that he'd gone and done something so stupid twice in the space of about a month.

But then again, he grudgingly acknowledged, he had been doing quite a few un-Thief-King-ish things over the past few weeks.

The still-dozing blond on the sofa was testament to this. Last night, after they'd finished talking at great length about him and Ryou and Mariku and even the damn Pharaoh and his light, and Malik had finished jumping to all sorts of crazy conclusions about the connections they shared (the fact that these conclusions were probably correct didn't make them any less crazy), there had been none of the customary 'lights out and time for bed' routine. The two of them had just sat there for the longest time – sometimes talking, sometimes running out of things to say. The TV had been switched on, off and back on again. There had been an odd tension in the air, and in Malik's movements and the way his eyes kept flicking towards the door and windows.

Bakura had wondered why Malik wasn't going to bed, and then the answer had occurred to him so suddenly, so _naturally, _that it had quite shocked his dried-up husk of a soul.

Malik was scared. Malik didn't want to be alone. Especially not in the dark.

In the greyish light of this drizzling Sunday morning, Bakura snorted to himself. What a _genius _he was becoming. Pretty soon he'd be so good at this feelings shit that he'd fit right in with the Pharaoh's band of cheerleaders, and hell, maybe it would even warm Ryou's granite little heart-

Anyway.

After having his awe-inspiring epiphany, Bakura had found himself just as ill-at-ease as he'd been when Malik had been locked in the bathroom saying goodbye to his lunch. Just because he was getting marginally better at interpreting people's (well, Malik's) thoughts and actions didn't mean that he had any idea what he was supposed to _do _with the knowledge. And so, he hadn't said anything. And Malik had followed the same course of action. Thus, in the end, when the stresses of the day finally took their toll on them, they had both simply fallen asleep where they were on the sofa.

It was nothing if not awkward.

Bakura's one saving grace, in his opinion, was that he had at least fallen asleep after and woken up before Malik. He still found the idea of someone seeing him sleeping highly undignified.

He had a vague, distant awareness that when he woke up some mornings, Malik had already left for college, which suggested that the blond had indeed seen him asleep (and, more disturbingly, had managed to move around and then leave the apartment without waking him), but he generally chose not to think about this.

Rather like on the morning following 'drunk Malik night', he went to take a shower in the hopes that it would convince some of his muscles to unknot themselves. He took his time, but when he was done and fully clothed once again, he found that Malik was still fast asleep, half-lying with his head leaning against the arm-rest. Bakura shook his head. The previous day's events must have really taken it out of him.

The blond didn't stir as Bakura moved quietly around the apartment, finding himself something to eat and shoving yesterday's clothes into his make-shift laundry bag. However, his sleep was rather rudely interrupted when Bakura's cell phone suddenly started blasting out some inane, cheery tune. The yami stared at the device blankly, wondering if he'd somehow broken it without even touching it.

The sound was short-lived and died after only a few heart-attack-inducing seconds, but it was enough. Malik's eyes fluttered open reluctantly.

"The hell was that...?" he mumbled with a deep frown, scrunching his eyes shut again.

"My phone went nuts," Bakura said dubiously, still looking at the gadget as if worried it might explode next.

At his voice Malik seemed to snap fully awake. He shot into a bolt-upright sitting position and looked at his surroundings bewilderedly. After a moment or two, realisation crept into his expression as the night before came back to him.

"Did we seriously both sleep here all night?" he questioned with an awkward laugh.

"Yeah," Bakura confirmed dryly. "And I don't care how weird it is; next time you feel like a slumber party, we're folding the damn bed down. I am not sleeping on it in sofa-form ever again."

"Sorry," Malik mumbled.

"...It's fine."

"So what did you do to your phone this time?" Malik asked in an obvious but welcome attempt to swerve the conversation away from the fact that the two of them had slept in uncomfortably close proximity, which really put something of a damper on Bakura's bad-ass image.

"I didn't do anything, it just started going crazy!" Bakura said defensively, throwing the thing (which he was starting to consider an _enemy_) to the blond, who glanced at the screen and laughed.

"You got a text message," he said. "Ooh, scary."

"I got a what?" Bakura said uncomprehendingly.

"Text message," Malik repeated patiently. He hadn't so far laughed at Bakura's ineptitude with modern technology, and the Thief sincerely hoped he wouldn't start anytime soon. He'd really hate to have to kill Malik. "Y'know, it's just a short message that gets sent to your phone. Look."

He pushed a button and held the cell up for Bakura to see – leaning down to peer at it, he saw the words 'YOU BETTER BE BACK AT WORK TODAY OR RYOU MIGHT CRY' on the screen. He found that the words 'From: Aso' above the message didn't really surprise him.

"I hate that idiot," he said dully.

"Friend of yours?" Malik chuckled, closing the text and starting to press buttons with an ease that Bakura was distantly envious of. Looking over the blond's shoulder, he saw that he was changing the volume settings so that it wouldn't be such an _event _if Kazuma decided to send him more stupid messages.

"Hardly," Bakura said irritably. "I think he was Ryou's 'bodyguard' before I showed up. Now he's just an annoying presence that never shuts up."

"Oh yeah, he's the one with the kid, right?" Malik questioned with a nod. "That little girl."

"Mio," Bakura confirmed. "The one person in the world Ryou still likes. Well, apart from you, maybe."

They both jumped when the cell phone buzzed again, though it was much quieter this time. It was (predictably) another message from Kazuma, this one reading 'Don't tell Ryou I said that. He'll kill us both.' Malik laughed while Bakura rolled his eyes.

"Are you going to go today?" Malik asked. "Work, I mean. Gods, it feels weird calling it 'work'. Makes you sound so normal."

"...Thanks?" Bakura said with a bemused blink. "I don't know. Depends on your plans."

"What do you mean?" Malik questioned, looking puzzled.

"I mean I can think of about a billion reasons not to leave you sitting alone in here today," Bakura said flatly, turning away slightly and folding his arms. Had that sounded mushy? He hoped not. It was hard to express the particular sentiment he was feeling _without _sounding mushy. He really didn't like the idea of leaving his new landlord on his own, though, and he really could think of a _lot _of reasons why. If Mariku had finally got bored of lurking in the shadows, there was no reason he wouldn't show up here today, and something trivial like a locked door was unlikely to stop him if he decided he wanted in. Bakura had already failed once to protect Malik from the psychopath – he wasn't about to do it _again. _And even if Mariku kept his distance, Bakura knew exactly what Malik would do if left in an empty apartment for hours on end. He'd start _thinking. _Malik did way too much thinking. He'd stress himself out and scare himself silly and _think himself into a damn corner. _

"I'll be alright," the blond said with a smile that was too bright to be convincing. "My ankle still hurts like hell, anyway, so I won't be going anywhere."

Bakura had forgotten about his ankle. Glancing down at it, he saw that it was definitely still swollen and starting to turn a decidedly unattractive shade of purple in places.

"...Shouldn't you get that looked at?" he asked.

"It's not broken," Malik replied simply, as if nothing apart from a snapped bone merited medical attention.

Just then, the house phone started ringing. Bakura wondered why they were so damn popular this morning. Both of them sat in silence and just let it ring out. When it finally went to voicemail, Bakura felt his eye twitch as a familiar (and _loud_) voice blasted from the speaker.

"_Ignoring the phone, Malik? Is that the next stage of your evil plan? Man, you're a monster!" _Jounouchi jeered. His voice, even in electronic form, seemed to echo off the walls. _"I know you're there, Yuugi told me what went down yesterday, so I figure you're gonna be holing yourself up in your apartment for at least a few days to come. ...Ok, ok, don't pick up, then, see if I care! Just thought I'd let you know that me and Yuugi'll be over soon. Nothing you can do about it. You better tell your house-guest to be on his best behaviour! See ya!"_

There was a small 'blip' sound as he hung up.

"...Well, that settles it," Bakura said bluntly. "I'm not sticking around if _that _moron is coming. And with the damn Pharaoh's light, no less..."

Malik just laughed, albeit weakly. Bakura figured he was probably relieved that he wasn't going to have to spend the day alone, but also somewhat apprehensive about the prospect of someone as tactless and boisterous as Jounouchi questioning him about the events of yesterday.

"If you're meant to be doing your usual shift at that place, you better hurry up," Malik said suddenly. "Didn't you notice we overslept?"

"Don't say 'we' and 'slept' in the same sentence, for God's sake," Bakura muttered, glancing at the time. "I should go, then. Think you'll survive until your idiot friends get here?"

"I'm pretty sure I'll manage," Malik said dryly.

Bakura didn't quite believe him, but he really was running late. He didn't want Ryou to get his hopes up and start thinking he might not show up again. He grabbed his coat and left the apartment – though he only started to make his way towards Angels' Lot once he'd ascertained that Mariku was nowhere in the vicinity.

Almost immediately after he left, Malik's phone rang again. The blond, who wasn't in nearly as good a mood as he'd tried to appear, gave a small groan and buried his face in his hands, wondering why people were suddenly unable to leave him alone whenever he just wanted a moment to himself. He hadn't been alone for one second since Bakura had come to his rescue yesterday (which he was thankful for) but now he just needed a minute to collect himself, to try and think this through, plan his next move...

Voicemail again.

"_Malik. I know very well that you're there, and I need you to pick up the phone right now."_

He winced. Isis. He was so not in the mood.

"_I'm waiting, Malik."_

He bit down on his lower lip. Maybe he could just ignore it, tell her he'd still been asleep when she called...

"_Yuugi called me. It seems you've been keeping some things from me and Rishid."_

Malik felt his heart freeze in his chest. Oh, that wasn't good.

What had Yuugi told her? How much?

He sighed. It looked like his sit-tight-and-ignore-it plan just wasn't going to cut it.

"Hi, Isis," he said dully as he picked up the phone. "Well done on remembering about the time difference."

"_Oh thank the Gods, I was starting to worry," _Isis replied, sounding genuinely relieved to hear his voice. _"Malik, are you alright? Yuugi said you saw...him..."_

"...Yeah," Malik said, his throat suddenly feeling very dry. "Yeah, he...he came to the shop. But I'm ok. I'm fine."

"_He didn't hurt you?"_

"No," he said, opting not to mention his ankle. It seemed a little bit lame compared to what they all knew his darkness was capable of. "I don't know why he came. But he's gone again. I don't know where he is now."

"_I don't like this," _Isis said fretfully. _"If he's going to start sneaking up on you like that...and who's to say it won't be worse next time...and with you living __**alone**__...!"_

Malik bit back the urge to tell her to stop making him nervous.

"I'm...scared," he said instead. He needed to say it. Admitting it was shameful but also made it a little more bearable. "I don't know what to do..."

"_I told you before, Rishid and I will come to you," _Isis said. _"We could leave Egypt tonight if we can find a flight..."_

"And what will you do once you're here?" Malik asked bleakly. "What can you do? You can't just make him disappear. You can't kill him or get him locked up or...anything. What difference will it really make if you're here?"

"_We can keep you safe," _Isis said almost fiercely.

"...That's ok," Malik said with a small smile. "Someone else has that covered."

"_The Pharaoh?" _Isis asked

"...Yeah, sure," Malik answered even as his lip curled slightly.

"_You're lying. Why are you lying to me?" _Isis demanded, starting to sound cross.

"What?"

"_You've been keeping things from us," _Isis said accusingly. _"Yuugi also told me that you've been having some...problems with the Pharaoh. He's taken a dislike to you."_

Malik narrowed his eyes slightly. Ok. It was bad enough that Yuugi had called his siblings and alerted them to the trauma of yesterday, but _this? _This was a betrayal.

"_Were you planning on ever telling us about this?" _Isis went on.

"No, I don't think so," Malik said flatly.

"_And why not?"_

"Well," Malik said slowly. "Don't you want to know why Atemu doesn't like me?"

"_Of course I want to know!" _Isis replied almost shrilly. It really was most unlike her. _"I want you to tell me everything so that I can help you resolve it! Isn't that what I'm supposed to do?"_

"I don't think this can be resolved," Malik said simply.

"_Why not? What on earth have you done?"_

Malik's grip on the phone tightened until his knuckles turned white. Wow, it had started already. _What have you done? What have you been up to __**this time? **_

"_...Malik? Please, talk to me. Listen, it's ok, Yuugi told me it isn't your fault. Did I sound like I was blaming you? I did, didn't I? I'm sorry, I just want to know what happened, I feel so cut off out here..."_

Malik blinked a few times as his sister babbled on anxiously.

"Wait," he said hesitantly. "You believe it's not my fault?"

"_Of course I believe it," _Isis said indignantly. _"Yuugi wouldn't tell me exactly what's going on between you and the Pharaoh, but he said you weren't to blame. Why wouldn't I believe that?"_

"I dunno," Malik mumbled. "Because it's me? Crazy me? Could-regress-at-any-time me?"

"_**Malik**__," _Isis exclaimed, sounding aghast. _"You really think we don't trust you? Honestly?"_

"Um," he said, not sure whether he should feel guilty. "I...sometimes..."

"_We __**worry **__about you. That's __**all**__," _Isis informed him sharply. _"And if you have an argument or disagreement with someone, even if it is the Pharaoh, I shouldn't have to hear about it from Yuugi. I should hear about it from my stupid little brother."_

Malik felt his mouth quirk into a smile – a real smile. He'd never been so happy to be called stupid.

"_So tell me, what did you do to make the Pharaoh angry?"_

"Oh...that..." Malik said uneasily. "Well..."

"_Malik..." _his sister said threateningly.

"Another thing I didn't tell you is that Bakura is back too," he said finally in a rush. There was a pause.

"_...Bakura? You mean the Thief King?"_

"Yeah, if you want to give him his proper title."

"_Why does that affect you?"_

Malik tried not to laugh – there had been few ways in which Bakura's return to the world _hadn't _affected him.

"I know where he is," he said carefully. "I've talked to him. And Pharaoh wants to find him. I'm not sure why, but I doubt it's so he can try and strike up a friendship. He asked me where Bakura is, and I wouldn't tell him. So now he...I don't know. Thinks we're in cahoots or something."

"_I see," _Isis said, sounding surprised. _"But why would you want to protect the Thief King?"_

"...Basically, I don't think he's evil," Malik said.

"_...Oh." _Isis sounded as if she wasn't sure whether he was joking or not. _"Are you...sure?"_

"Isis, can you think of anyone who'd be a better judge than me?" Malik pointed out wryly. "After spending time on both sides of the divide, I think I have a pretty good idea..."

"_Don't say that," _Isis scolded. _"Just...be careful. There's a difference between being 'not evil' and being trustworthy. And with your own darkness creeping around, the last thing you need is to start having trouble with someone else's..."_

Malik couldn't help but snort.

"I wouldn't say he was causing me too much trouble," he said lightly. "I wasn't lying when I said someone has...keeping me safe covered."

There was a lengthy silence on the line.

"_It sounds like things have got a little crazy over there," _Isis said finally with a weak laugh.

"Sure have," Malik agreed. "It's not all bad, though."

"_But about the Pharaoh...what are you going to do?"_

"Aw, I don't know," Malik groaned, raking a hand through his hair. "I'm not going back to the Game Shop, anyway. I quit. That might keep him happy for a while."

"_You quit your job?" _Isis said in shock. _"It's that bad?"_

"He...doesn't like having me around."

"_That's...hm," _his sister said with obvious disapproval – though what exactly she disapproved of, Malik wasn't sure. _"That's unfortunate."_

"I'll find another job as quickly as I can," he assured her.

"_Do your best," _she told him. _"But don't worry, we can send you a bit more money in the meantime. That's no trouble."_

"Are you sure?" Malik said with a blink.

"_Of course. After all, it sounds as if it isn't your fault that you're now unemployed."_

"I just...don't want to go back there," he muttered. "The way he looks at me, Isis, it's like...no, sorry," he cut himself off and shook his head. No point in bitching about it. That just made him sound bitter and petty.

"_...Listen," _Isis said after a pause. _"I know we were 'lucky' enough not to have to face the trials and tribulations of school when we were younger, but everyone I know got the same piece of advice from their parents when they were having problems with other children."_

"And...what's that?" Malik asked, somewhat perplexed.

"_Don't pick fights with other kids," _Isis said sagely. _"But if another kid hits you, you're allowed to hit back."_

Malik almost laughed out loud.

"I'll keep that in mind," he said.

* * *

Things were marginally more tense than usual at the Lot. Both Ryou and Bakura were getting a strong 'I know something you don't know' vibe from each other, but neither of them was willing to give way and suggest they compare notes on the events of the previous day.

"It's weird," Bakura spoke up finally with faux-lightness that he knew would instantly raise Ryou's suspicions. "You haven't asked about what happened yesterday."

"...That's because I'm going to ask Malik later," Ryou said, peering over at him with narrowed eyes, clearly suspecting he was being led into some kind of trap.

"No, it's because you already know," Bakura said pleasantly. That was actually something of a stab in the dark, but when Ryou's glare intensified he knew it was true.

"Hm. And _how _do you know, I wonder...?" he muttered, already having a fair idea.

"I phoned Malik," Ryou said shortly.

"...No, you didn't," Bakura said, a smirk tugging at his mouth. Since Malik hadn't left his side for over twelve hours, he knew he hadn't received any phone-calls.

"You really think you know everything, don't you?" Ryou sneered, turning away from him and putting an impressive amount of concentration into frying some bacon.

"Not everything," Bakura said with a shrug. "But I know there are only two ways you could know what happened yesterday."

"That so?"

"Uh-huh. One: you went to that Game Shop."

Ryou said nothing, but Bakura didn't miss the way he pressed his lips into a thin line, as if fighting back distaste.

"But since you and Pharaoh aren't exactly loved-up at the moment, I don't think that's it," Bakura went on. "So let's go with option number two. You talked to Mariku."

"...So what if I did?" Ryou said with an off-hand snort, as if he were trying to make it sound like it was no big deal. But the sudden stiffening of his shoulders betrayed the fact that he knew it really was _something _of a big deal.

He squeaked in fright when a spatula smacked the wall just to the left of his head before falling into the frying pan. He whipped around to glare at his darkness.

"Did you _really _just throw a spatula at me?" he asked, seeming torn between disbelief and plain outrage.

"You're lucky it wasn't that steak knife you're so fond of," Bakura sneered back, folding his arms. The spatula had been the first non-lethal implement to hand, though he was already inwardly lamenting his lame choice of weapon. "I've asked this before, but _why _were you talking to him?"

"Why shouldn't I?" Ryou snapped, gingerly rescuing the spatula from the crackling bacon grease. "Anyway, it's not like I went _looking _for him."

"...He went to you."

"Yes."

"Shit..." Bakura muttered, briefly clapping a hand over his eyes. "You know I can't be in two places at once, right? You and Malik are going to have to move in together if he's after _both _of you now..."

"What are you talking about now?" Ryou said, rolling his eyes. "He's not a threat to anyone."

Bakura stared at him with half-lidded eyes, trying his utmost to transmit his message of '_You're an idiot you don't know anything just shut the fuck up' _through their link. Somehow. He suspected spirit-links didn't work that way but that didn't stop him trying.

"Don't you get it?" he said as calmly as he could. "He's...messing with you. He's _lying. _If he seems harmless, it's because he _wants _you to think he's harmless, he wants you to trust him because that'll make it that much easier for him to get to Malik-"

"Oh, shut up!" Ryou cried out. "It sounds like _you're _the one trying to mess with me. Trying to stop me from trusting _anyone._"

"You can trust whoever you like, just as long as it's not _him -_!"

"And why not?"

"Gods..." Bakura growled, patience officially spent. "What part of '_He tried to kill your best friend' _just isn't getting _through _to you?"

"And there you go again," Ryou said waspishly. "Talking like you're so much _better. _Don't you think I should be mad at Malik for taking _you _in? After everything you did? If it's ok for Malik to be around you, then it should be fine for me to-"

"I'm not going to _hurt _Malik," Bakura interjected. "That's the difference."

Ryou's forehead twitched into a questioning frown.

"...Mariku might hurt you," Bakura said with a gruff, awkward shrug. "That's his...thing. That's all I'm saying."

Ryou's frown deepened and he turned back to the sizzling pan. Bakura could practically see his thought process as he tried to come up with some selfish motive that he might have for not wanting Mariku to hurt him. It was frustrating to watch – especially since he knew Ryou's crazy little mind _would _be able to come up with something. Because the simplest conclusion – that he, Bakura Touzoku, former Stealer of Souls and partial Lord of All Darkness, did not want him to get hurt – was _unacceptable._

"...Whatever you think of Mariku," Ryou muttered suddenly. "He sure seems to have got a weird impression of _you_. He...thinks you care about Malik."

Bakura blinked. He and Mariku had only crossed paths that one time – had he really given such a big display of protectiveness? He supposed he had told him to back off and stay away. It seemed to go deeper than that, though, if the way Ryou was peering at him suspiciously from the corner of his eye was any indication.

"So why couldn't you make it here yesterday?" the teen asked finally. "The real reason."

"Malik didn't take too _kindly _to Mariku sneaking up on him," Bakura said dryly. "He needed some help."

To hell with it. He wasn't going to lie. Ryou wouldn't believe anything he said, anyway.

"And he asked _you_?"

"There was no one else."

Hurt flashed across Ryou's face, then anger.

"And you...helped him."

"Yeah, I guess I did."

"Why?"

That one word, thrown out in the fluorescent-buzzing air of the kitchen, came out more of a harsh bark than a simple question.

Bakura let his gaze drift thoughtfully to the ceiling as he turned all the possible reasons over in his head – real reasons that his back-in-business humanity would admit to; reasons that he would have laughed and sneered at as little as a few weeks ago.

_Why? Because I said I'd protect him. Because I owe him. Because Malik's the first person to treat me like a fellow human being in over five millennia. Because he doesn't deserve to be scared. Because I didn't want him to be scared. Because he needed me._

_I helped him because I wanted to help him. Weird but true. _

_Because I like Malik. Because, yeah, I care about Malik._

Bakura gave a small, rueful smirk. None of those reasons would be good enough for his light.

"Answer me," he heard Ryou say darkly.

"No," he replied shortly.

He fixed his eyes on Ryou, saw the surprise flit across his face before it was quickly replaced by a glower.

"Why not?" he demanded.

"Because," Bakura said levelly, turning away from him, "You wouldn't believe me anyway. You ask me questions like that just so you can shoot my answer down in flames. You pick apart everything I say and twist it so that I stay the bad guy. That's..._your _thing."

He stopped and took a deep breath. He knew that had probably hit Ryou like a two-ton anvil. After all, Malik might be getting used to hearing him talk like that, but it was likely that his light now thought his mind had been taken over by aliens.

He kept his back turned, so he didn't see Ryou staring at him for a good few minutes, occasionally opening and closing his mouth as he thought of replies that he apparently rejected before actually giving them voice.

When he finally looked back to the frying pan, the bacon was burnt.

* * *

Jounouchi was surprised by Malik's stony expression when he answered the door. Yuugi wasn't.

"You called my sister," the young Egyptian said accusingly, frowning at the diminutive teen.

"Yeah, I did," Yuugi agreed with a nod.

"Why?"

"Because I knew you wouldn't," Yuugi said simply with a rueful smile.

"Am I missing something here?" Jounouchi questioned, looking between the two of them with a raised eyebrow.

"Not really," Yuugi said with a shrug. His smile lost its melancholy edge. "I've just been rallying Malik's allies."

"Yeah!" Jounouchi cheered as they went inside the apartment. "It's time for the ultimate battle of good and evil! Except we don't really know who's which anymore."

"Does Pharaoh know you're here?" Malik asked, ignoring Jou's excitable babbling.

"Of course he does," Yuugi replied. "Come _on, _Malik, we're friends. I'm not going to start sneaking out to visit you just because Atemu doesn't like it."

"We could totally mess with him, though," Jounouchi put in with a grin. "Let's call him and say Malik's taken us hostage."

No one laughed.

"..._Alright, _my serious face is on," Jou grumbled. "Can't blame a guy for trying to lighten the mood."

* * *

Bakura had been planning to make, at the very least, a cursory search for Mariku once his shift at the Lot ended. As it happened, he didn't have to look far.

Ryou had ducked outside before him, not even waiting for him to finish donning his coat. Bakura merely rolled his eyes at this, knowing he could easily catch up to his light in a minute, but he felt a stab of panic when he heard a startled cry from beyond the open door. Dashing out in full battle-mode, he found Ryou standing with his arms folded and an annoyed frown on his face.

"You scared me!" he exclaimed. "You need to stop popping up like that!"

"Sorry," Mariku replied (rather insincerely) with a snigger. "At least you didn't fall over."

"Yeah, lucky for-"

Ryou cut himself off with a yelp when Bakura seized his arm and hauled him back to stand behind him, glaring at Malik's darkness all the while.

"Oh. The Thief is here today," Mariku remarked, as if only just noticing Bakura's presence.

"Sure is," Ryou said irritably, rubbing at his arm even though Bakura knew full well he hadn't grabbed him hard enough to really hurt him.

"What do you want?" Bakura snarled. As convenient as this was, he still didn't _like _being in the presence of the king of the criminally insane.

"Nothing from you," Mariku said mildly.

"Will you give it a rest?" Ryou said, rolling his eyes.

"Be quiet," Bakura snapped at him before turning back to the blond spirit. "What the hell were you playing at yesterday?"

"I wasn't playing anything," Mariku said with a small frown.

"Yeah? You took about twenty years off Malik's life," Bakura growled. "After all that _bullshit _about how you were going to stay away from him! And now you've got _him_," he paused to jab a finger in Ryou's direction, "actually believing that you're some nice guy that everyone just fucking _misjudged. _I don't buy it. So come on, show your real face. Who are you planning to kill first? Him or Malik?"

Mariku flinched slightly at the word 'kill', but Bakura didn't stop.

"What if I just killed you now?" he said darkly. "That might save a _lot _of trouble..."

"Stop talking about killing," Mariku said unhappily.

Bakura felt his anger and frustration reach melting point – those feelings had been building up ever since Malik had called him with his plea for help the day before and now he needed to _vent, _he wanted Mariku to _react_, to show some of that inherent violence and bloodlust, and give him an excuse to just cut loose. He growled and started forward, fists clenched, but stopped with a startled blink when Ryou stepped in front of him with a frown on his face and a hand on his shoulder. It was the hand that caught Bakura's attention, mostly. Something pretty serious had to be up for Ryou to make actual physical contact with him of his own accord.

"Stop it," the teen said firmly.

Bakura stared blankly at him for a moment. Gods. Mariku must have really laid it on thick for Ryou to think he had to defend him.

The fury was still burning in him. He didn't have to stop. It would be easy to shove his light aside and just finish what he'd started and either beat Malik's darkness until he got the damn _message _or just make good on his word and kill him.

Ryou was still looking at him defiantly. He wouldn't move aside without a fight.

Bakura felt his anger slowly fizzle away and be replaced by a doomed sense of helplessness. He couldn't do it. Mariku had messed with Ryou's head to a horrific extent. To attack Mariku would be an act of villainy. Another thing that would just _cement _Ryou's hatred for him.

He lowered his head and let his hands uncurl. No matter what he might say, further worsening his light's opinion of him was not something he wanted to do.

Seeing that he was neutralised for the time being, Ryou immediately drew his hand back.

"...Stay _away _from Malik," Bakura said at length, glaring heatedly at Mariku over his light's shoulder. "Go near him again and I _will _hurt you. You don't have the Rod anymore, you've got _nothing. _You're powerless. And I won't hold back if you _dare _to go near Malik ever again-"

"You're not so above this, Thief," Mariku said lowly. His violet eyes were slightly narrowed, and he looked to be on the verge of anger for the first time since his return to the world. "Look at you. You're no better. Always with your light, even when you know he doesn't want you there. Even though he just spits hate at you. Because you know it's what you have to do. You know that if you do as he wants and stay away, it won't get any better. You'll never be able to fix it that way."

"Shut up," Bakura snarled, extremely conscious of Ryou standing between them and listening to every word.

"If I told you to stay away from him, you wouldn't do it. Would you?" Mariku said.

"Don't talk as if we're on the same 'level'," Bakura growled. "It's completely different-"

"It's not different," Mariku said plainly with a small shrug. "You and I, the things we did were unforgiveable. And unforgiveable is unforgiveable, it doesn't even matter exactly what you did when it gets that bad. The only thing that's different now is the feelings left behind."

"You're not even _trying _to make sense," Bakura snapped, folding his arms.

"It's not so _hard_," Mariku said indolently. "Your light is angry. He _hates._ Omote is scared."

"I'm standing right here..." Ryou muttered. He was ignored.

"Great observation," Bakura remarked acidly.

"It's ok for you to always be with your light, because hate likes to be fed," Mariku said, eyes narrowing further. "Hate screams and complains and lashes out but it doesn't really want to be left alone. It wants proof of why it exists, it wants more and more bad things to pile on top of it because that makes it _stronger-_"

"You'd know about that," Bakura sneered.

"Standing. Right. _Here_," Ryou said through gritted teeth.

"Fear is different," Mariku concluded in a much softer voice. "Fear hides. Fear doesn't want anyone to look at it."

"Don't talk about him like that!" Bakura found himself thundering. "Don't make him sound so pathetic, you know why he's scared, you know it's _all your fault_-!"

"And what about the hate, Thief?" Mariku challenged quietly. "Whose fault is that?"

Bakura opened his mouth to retort but words failed him. The urge to _maim _returned, stronger than before. _Bastard! Not fair not fair not fair don't make me say that out loud-!_

"You and I..." Mariku said slowly. "We're just the same, Thief."

"No, you're really not," Ryou put in with a slight grimace. It irked Bakura more than he'd like to admit that his light really thought he was _worse _than Malik's darkness. It was one complication he'd never seen coming.

Mariku chuckled to himself.

"You two really are two halves of a whole," he remarked. "You're both so stupid."

Neither Ryou nor Bakura would ever admit or acknowledge it, but the glares they sent the blond yami at that moment were almost identical.

"...I'm warning you one last time," Bakura ground out finally, deciding to just ignore that last comment. "Stay away from Malik."

"It would be easier to stay away if you two did a better job of looking after him," Mariku replied. His tone implied neither anger nor blame; it was just a fact. And maybe they both knew it.

Bakura was about to throw out a reply but whatever he had been planning to say vanished from his mind when Ryou suddenly spun on his heel and started to march briskly away from them, his head down and his hands jammed in his pockets.

"Where are you going?" Bakura called after him in irritation (and some amount of bewilderment). His light didn't reply. If anything, he just quickened his pace.

"...You'd better go after him," Mariku said after a moment. "Don't let him go into the dark alone."

"What?" Bakura growled, wondering if that had been some kind of veiled threat. Mariku just stared back at him benignly.

"You better stay away from _both _of them. Malik _and _Ryou," Bakura ground out at length. "If you hurt either of them, I'll...I swear I'll..."

"You're doing it again," Mariku said with the faintest hint of annoyance. "It's ok for you to be with omote, but it's not ok for me to be near your light...?"

"Yes! Because I'm _not like you!_" Bakura roared, all semblance of self-control officially _spent, _especially now that Ryou wasn't here to see him lose it. He could hit Mariku now, he realised dimly. There was no one here to stop him now.

"Hm," Malik's darkness said plainly, looking thoughtful. "Wrong. But I know what you mean."

"You're fucking insane. Even worse than before," Bakura hissed. He still wanted to hit him (to _punish _him for reducing Malik to the wreck he'd been yesterday) but his feet were already carrying him down the street before he'd finished speaking. Because he had to go after Ryou. Because Ryou was alone in the dark and that was _bad. _He shot one more stormy look back at Malik's darkness but left it at that – no point in picking a fight with a _potential _threat to Ryou's safety when he might be walking into a more current threat at that very moment.

Bakura broke into a light run (not a full-out sprint, that was hardly _necessary_) and caught up to his light after a few streets. Fortunately, Ryou did not appear to have been accosted in any way during their brief separation.

"What'd you run off for?" Bakura muttered as he fell into step with him, slightly out of breath. Ryou didn't even look up to acknowledge his arrival.

"You're idiots," he mumbled, eyes fixed on the sidewalk. "Both of you. You both say such _stupid things._"

Bakura's forehead creased into a faint frown as he wondered exactly what he _and _Mariku had said that Ryou had taken such an aversion to. He knew he wasn't likely to work it out, though. He didn't _get _Ryou these days.

"Well, he _is _a complete psycho," he offered instead.

"What's your excuse?" Ryou returned bitingly.

Bakura snorted dryly and gave up, letting that hideous silence swallow them up as usual.

"...I know you won't tell me what the deal is, because you're being _difficult_," Ryou spoke up finally, glancing up at his darkness with mixed suspicion and annoyance. "But you seem...protective of Malik."

Bakura gave a non-committal shrug. He was not getting into a discussion about that with Ryou. He wasn't going to let Ryou chew him up and spit him out over something like _that, _which he wasn't even entirely comfortable with himself yet.

"I find it hard to believe. But I guess you _owe _him," Ryou said flatly, returning his gaze to the ground in front of his feet. "So I'm just saying. I think Pharaoh is more of a threat to him than Mariku."

"...I wouldn't say he's _more _of a threat," Bakura replied with a grimace. "But he is a problem."

"So what are you going to do about it?" Ryou asked primly.

"Gee, I dunno, maybe I'll challenge him to a duel," Bakura said sarcastically. "It should be less of a problem from now on, anyway. Malik quit his job."

"He _what?_" Ryou all but squawked, whipping around to face him with an expression overflowing with alarm.

"You heard," Bakura said gruffly, wondering if his light was going to find a way to make this his fault too. "Said he didn't want to go back to that shop."

"Oh, this just gets worse and worse," Ryou seethed, apparently to himself. His look was so murderous by this point that even Bakura was mildly unnerved by it. "I might kill him, I really might_..._"

"Holy shit," Bakura said with slight amusement. "Why are you asking me what _I'm _going to do about it? You seem to have it covered. Go at the Pharaoh with that face and he might just die on the spot."

Ryou peered up at him, seeming unsure whether that had been an insult or not.

"Besides, one of the reasons he's giving Malik shit is because he _expects_ me to pick a fight with him," Bakura went on. "It might have more...impact coming from you."

"I can only hope so," Ryou muttered. "That bastard. And Malik will _never _retaliate, he'll just sit there and take it without a word and..._bastard._"

Bakura couldn't help but give a small smirk. It was nice to know that he and his light really did agree on something.

* * *

On his way back to Malik's apartment, Bakura had completely forgotten that the blond had been expecting visitors when he'd left earlier in the day. Even if he _had _remembered, he wouldn't have thought anything of it; he didn't know how long friends could sit and talk about nothing. Therefore, when he reached the apartment block, he was gripped by the sudden urge to put his fist through the nearby wall when the Pharaoh's light emerged from the building just as he was approaching it.

_No. I've dealt with Ryou today, __**and **__I've dealt with Mariku. Do not make me deal with you too, I may just kill myself. Or you. Are you feeling lucky?_

"Oh," Yuugi said with a surprised blink upon noticing him. Bakura cursed himself for being so slow. If he'd been quicker, he could have hidden behind a ...street-lamp, or something.

"Uh...hi," Yuugi said with an attempt at a smile. Bakura regarded him with a half-lidded glower, hoping that he'd get the message and just _leave. _No such luck. "You timed that pretty well, huh? I hope you haven't been waiting out here."

"Don't be stupid," Bakura snapped before he could stop himself. Yuugi looked faintly triumphant at managing to elicit a response. The yami scowled darkly.

"Malik told me what the deal is with you and him," Yuugi went on lightly. "I don't think he was planning to, but Jou kind of blabbed a few major details, so...yeah. It's fine, by the way. If Malik trusts you then I guess I can sleep easy."

"What about your delightful other half?" Bakura sneered, subconsciously casting a glance up at Malik's window, as if Atemu might have been standing there watching him. "Did you bring him round to hear the story too?"

"Of course not," Yuugi said coolly. "And I won't be telling him, so you can just calm down. It's not like I'm happy that he's decided to pick on Malik."

"Wow. I didn't know you two were capable of disagreeing," Bakura said dully, doing his best to hide his surprise at this revelation.

"Yeah? I didn't know _you _were capable of being the hero," Yuugi said with a small smile. "But you seemed to do a pretty good job yesterday."

Bakura felt his left eye twitch.

"Is that what Malik told you?" he said with his best derisive sneer, hoping to discredit anything remotely complimentary that might have been said about him.

"No, he didn't mention it," Yuugi replied, looking amused. "But that phone booth is real close to the Game Shop, you know. And I have _eyes._"

His knowing smile told Bakura everything he needed to know. He glared at his arch-enemy's light resentfully.

"Relax, I won't tell anyone," Yuugi said with a laugh, finally starting to walk in the direction of his home. Once he'd gone a few paces, he paused and looked back over his shoulder. "Take care of Malik, ok?"

Bakura stared, dumbfounded, at his retreating back for a few moments before grumbling to himself and entering the apartment block, all the while wondering why _no one _around here was scared of him anymore.

He was highly relieved to find Malik alone in the apartment – after the evening he'd just had, Jounouchi might have been the final straw that would have set him off on a murderous rampage.

"Hey," Malik said with his usual smile as he shut the door behind him. "You timed that well."

"Yeah, that's what your friend said, too," Bakura said irritably, hanging up his coat. Malik visibly winced.

"You two met?" he asked, though it was fairly obvious.

"It was a lovely reunion," Bakura said, rolling his eyes. "I mean, I haven't seen him since...the Memory World? And what fun we had there."

Malik snickered.

"Well, I have something that might cheer you up," he said, holding up a large brown envelope. His teasing smile alerted Bakura to the possibility that the envelope's contents might _not _actually cheer him up at all.

"What is it...?" he asked suspiciously.

"Have a look," Malik said with a grin, handing him the envelope. Opening the flap and reaching inside, Bakura extracted a small pile of documents of varying sizes. His brow furrowed in mild confusion as he flicked through them.

"Congratulations," Malik said brightly. "You exist!"

"No kidding," Bakura said, his mouth twitching into a grudging smirk. "Gods. I can't believe your moron friend actually talked Kaiba into this."

"I'm sure Jou can be very persuasive," Malik said with a sly glint in his eyes. "They really thought of everything, too. You've even got school reports in there. You really sucked at Math, by the way."

"What?" Bakura scowled when he found one of the fabricated reports. Most of the grades were very average (almost average enough to arouse suspicion in anyone who already doubted the document's authenticity) but, as Malik said, Kaiba had decided to make it look like he was numerically illiterate. Probably a petty act of revenge for all those times he'd used Mokuba as part of his plans.

"And you had...discipline problems..." Malik went on, clearly struggling to suppress laughter. "It's kind of funny, because I get a feeling that, if you _had _gone to school, your reports would have looked a lot like that."

"Sure," Bakura said dryly, pulling out the fake passport and flipping it open. "What the hell is with this picture? It doesn't even look like me."

"That's because it's not you. It's computer-generated," Malik sniggered. "Apparently just asking for a photo of you was too humbling for Kaiba. But no one really looks like their passport photo. I'm sure it'll be fine."

"Great," Bakura said flatly, flopping unceremoniously onto the sofa. "Hn. It's weird, having stuff like this. It all looks so...legal."

"And yet, it's very, very illegal," Malik pointed out. "So that should suit you."

Bakura snorted before sneaking a glance at the young Egyptian. He _seemed _to be in a good mood, but he was slowly beginning to learn that that counted for very little with Malik. If he wanted to seem like he was in a good mood, he could give a performance to make movie-critics cry.

"You alright?" Bakura asked, hoping the unexpected question would be enough to shock Malik into honesty.

The blond blinked at him in surprise, but his expression remained bright. Bakura could see tiredness and stress lingering around his eyes, but they were secondary. He seemed ok. Maybe he felt safe.

It still bewildered Bakura to no end that Malik could feel safe because he was there.

"Yeah, I'm good," Malik replied with a smile. A real smile. Not a _please-don't-worry-about-me _smile.

Bakura nodded.

He had been planning to tell Malik that he'd seen Mariku and warned him off, but in the end he didn't. After all, he knew the mere mention of Mariku's name would be enough to shatter Malik's well-deserved contentment. And he really didn't want to be the one to wipe that smile off his face.

* * *

_**Lol at the first scene...I think I just unintentionally fanned the flames of potential thiefshipping. SORRY.**_

_**Thank you so much to Junki, Teddy syn, ArielPark, Bokmal14, bbb136, SheepAteMyFanBoys, ani, VampirePrinssess, IceDragon1095, Stevie-Kai, Wolfwhispers, crazyhikari, schoolkid, SHADOWoftheFOX, Affy-Bakura, Hotaru Layla, Lady Blackwell, EgyptianSoul 88, FluffyGewitter, chibi heishi, pride1289, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, Schizo-of-Destiny, Yosenity, sunokofairytale, melisse, safa'at keruth, MissPessimist, ACE329, earthluva, ShizukaLawliet13, Seto K4iba1, Empresss Spiral, Tender Loving Care, bansheegrrl, ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry bomb, GoodAndPl3nty, TexasDreamer01, xXMekkzyFwuffzXx, Obnoxious Celtic guard, PreTENDER, scrawling purple ink, Chibi Kafka, I Dance The Tango, Aesop's Julie, BlueSpiritFire1, haku fan1, Airyballoon, Neko, ankellysaurus, kathrine, Hikari-Kira1, Callette, Innocent Demon, Jade Cade, echochaos, MimeGirl69, Manana and Calm Envy. I'm telling Santa to give you all extra presents :)**_

_**And extra thanks to Lady Blackwell for beta-ing :) I'd bake you a cake if you weren't...y'know. So far away. **_

_**Ok, a lot of people called me out on Mariku's 'dirty things' comment. Yes, it's true, he wouldn't know much about that. I just thought it was too funny to pass up :P Please see my livejournal for my pitiful attempt to explain it away in PICTURE FORM. Link is in my profile.**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	22. Tip Of The Iceberg

_**Chapter 22: Tip Of The Iceberg **_

Ryou had planned to pay Malik a visit after hearing about his apparently harrowing ordeal from Mariku. He'd gone as far as slotting it into his plan for the next day – he'd been ready to inform Bakura that he wanted to go to Malik's apartment after he finished work (which roughly translated as 'kindly fuck off and don't show your face for a few hours'), and he'd invented an excuse for visiting that wasn't 'I've been hanging out with your dark side and he's got me on a guilt-trip'. He'd even come up with his exit line (something about needing to pick up milk before the convenience store closed) to counteract Malik's inevitable insistence that he stay for dinner, for the night, forever.

But then Ryou hadn't gone.

He hadn't mentioned his intentions to Bakura for his entire shift, and then he'd stood and listened to Bakura and Mariku shooting nonsense back and forth at each other for a while, and in the end he'd just stomped home and sat in his empty apartment like he did every other Sunday night.

He tried not to linger on the reason why, because Ryou didn't like to think of himself as stupid.

As he did with everything that didn't sit right with him, he did his best to blame it on other things. Bakura, mainly. Bakura would never have agreed to disappear for the evening so that he could visit his friend, because that would have been a _nice _thing to do and Bakura didn't do _nice. _And anyway, he'd been kind of tired. And Malik had probably been busy. Malik had probably been tired too, in fact, since he probably hadn't slept very well following his trauma. Yes, he'd surely been _far too tired _for company-

He wrapped the real reason up in so many of those lame excuses, like wrapping a shard of glass in layer upon layer of cotton wool. In the end, he buried it completely.

But it was still there.

And the real reason was simple.

If he'd gone to visit, Malik would have taken one look at him before shoving a thermometer in his mouth, tucking him up in the nearest bed and keeping him prisoner there indefinitely.

Because Malik knew what Ryou looked like when he was becoming seriously ill.

Ryou knew – on some level – that he was sick, and getting progressively sicker as he stubbornly kept to his normal, exhausting routine. He knew he'd been sick for some time now. But knowing wasn't the same as acknowledging.

He knew, but he pretended not to know.

It was easier.

Nothing can hurt you if you don't acknowledge it.

And so long as he avoided Malik, no one else was ever going to notice.

_Not unless he died- _No.

The Angels' Lot clientele, who usually looked at him through a fugue of intoxication and the excessively dim lights of the club, wouldn't see anything. Kazuma had commented on his increasingly haggard appearance a few times already, but he was quick to accept excuses about having had trouble sleeping or a bad hangover or whatever other excuse came to mind. Kazuma had given up on trying to work Ryou out a long time ago.

And Bakura. Bakura wouldn't see. It wasn't as if Bakura ever _looked _at him. _Properly _looked at him, that is. The way you do for someone you give a shit about. That was never going to happen.

No one was going to see, and Ryou wasn't going to see either.

He was going to shut his eyes and keep going.

Because if he stopped, if he let himself stop for even one second, everything might just fall apart.

(And Malik couldn't blame him for this. After all, Malik hid from the things that scared him too.)

* * *

Bakura had, in fact, noticed that Ryou hadn't exactly been looking his best recently.

From the moment he'd landed back in the land of the living, he'd had a distant awareness that his light was considerably paler, thinner and altogether more gaunt-looking than he remembered. And since then, in recent weeks especially, this downward trend seemed to be continuing. The dark shadows around his eyes deepened. His face was pale enough to rival the last remnants of the snow that still clung to the rooftops and tree branches. Sometimes he shivered all over, even though Angels' Lot tended to get unpleasantly warm, especially in the kitchen.

Unfortunately, Bakura only _noticed _these things. He observed. He didn't think. He didn't _connect. _It was a failing of his. It often took something blunt and concrete (like Ryou producing a knife from his jacket pocket) for him to really process everything he'd seen into something tangible – something with meaning.

What did catch his attention, however, was the fact that Ryou didn't make good on his word to deal out some form of punishment to the Pharaoh. Bakura couldn't deny that he was, first and foremost, disappointed – he'd been looking forward to the phone-call Malik would inevitably receive from Atemu's light after Ryou did something crazy or delightfully violent. But it never came. He never heard anything, which he took to mean that nothing had happened. And that surprised him. Ryou had seemed so pissed off. So _serious. _

But still, he didn't manage to connect the two things. Ryou looked like crap. Ryou didn't rain death on the Pharaoh's soul. They were completely unrelated in his mind. Bakura still hadn't fully re-learned how complex human beings could be. He hadn't got to grips with the fact that very little to do with any person was completely compartmentalised.

If there was a higher power waiting for him to put the pieces together, it must have been brain-dead with despair.

Bakura wasn't allowed to remain ignorant, though.

Maybe it _was_ the interference of some higher power. Maybe it was just the way his connection to Ryou was programmed. Or maybe _some miniscule part _of Ryou was screaming out for help, and he was the only one who could hear.

In any case, almost two weeks after the Game Shop incident, _something _decided that it was time for things to unravel.

Ryou wasn't going to like it.

* * *

_Can't move._

_Hot too hot can't move. Oh God._

_What day is it what month is it where am I still at home? Breathe. Doesn't smell like a hospital. Home._

_Alone?_

_Please alone_

_Please not alone_

_Please please someone Malik are you there?_

"_Ryou? Ryou. You can hear me, right?"_

_Malik you sound so far away._

_Hear you. Can't see you. Can't see move speak can't __**open my eyes. **__Tired tired sleepy sinking don't want to sleep again don't want to go back into the darkness no __**I WANT TO WAKE UP.**_

"_Ryou. Please. Just...do something. If you can hear me."_

_Want to, can't, sorry so sorry. Please stay Malik please don't leave me here please I can hear you I'm sorry I-_

"_Let me know you're in there."_

_In here. Yes. Stuck in here. Diving bell and the butterfly. I'm trying Malik I'm really trying, trying to blink or twitch a finger or do __**something, **__you sound so scared and I'm sorry, I'm trying but but but_

_But I'm so tired._

_Something stole my bones._

_I lie here shapeless boneless and the bed is going to swallow me up take my hand Malik keep me here __**please. **_

_Wish I could see you._

_You're my best friend. Did I tell you that? Hope I told you that. Too late now._

_Am I dying?_

_Maybe I'm already dead._

_Soon I'll be too tired to breathe, heart too tired to beat._

_I'm like a puppet that's had its strings cut._

_Oh that's funny a puppet get it get it GET IT?_

_So heavy. Carved from stone, that's me. Stone doesn't move so why should I?_

"_Ryou, I don't know what to do, please stop it Ryou, __**please**__..."_

_Oh that's why._

_Sorry Malik not today the darkness is winning it's coming down it's crushing me slow slow but steady here it comes the sleepy darkness and I'll sleep again and it might be the last time maybe I won't wake up again it's possible it's probable maybe it's preferable._

_It's coming sooner or later._

_Maybe I should just give it one...last...push._

_But now_

_Sleep._

_

* * *

_

Bakura's eyes snapped open, staring around frantically at Malik's darkened apartment which took a few seconds to register as familiar in his mind.

And for just one instant, one horrific, heart-stopping instant, the reality of the dream

_the dream the memory the __**fucking acid trip?**_

didn't dissipate. He couldn't move, his limbs were leaden, rigor mortis had officially set in, he was stuck stuck stuck- he could _think, _he could _feel _every inch of his limp, ragdoll-like body but the very idea of moving one inch seemed insane and gargantuan and one hundred percent impossible because...because...

Because he was _so tired _and and and-

The moment ended.

He shot up into a sitting position just to prove to himself that he could. He was breathing a lot more rapidly than he'd ever like to admit. (Panicked, scared breathing- _no, not scared, __**never **__scared!_)

He only just managed to choke back a strangled cry as his hand flew to his chest, fingers scrabbling madly at the skin even though the problem was more than skin deep, and may not have been strictly physical at all.

His connection to Ryou was alive and kicking again – and it was going berserk.

* * *

When Malik emerged from his bedroom in the morning, he was very much surprised to find the sofa-bed already folded away and a _very _agitated-looking Thief King stalking the room like a trapped animal. Bakura seemed to make a concerted effort to be awake before him most days, but he didn't always manage it, and it was pretty unusual for him to be awake, up _and_ ready before Malik any day of the week – the yami was, after all, working the graveyard shift almost every night. Today in particular, when Malik had to get up especially early for a morning lecture at college, it was downright bizarre.

"Bakura?" he said, blinking. "What are you doing up already?"

"Why shouldn't I be?" Bakura shot back, glaring. If Malik hadn't already surmised that something was wrong, this would have been enough to inform him of as much. Bakura didn't snap at him without reason anymore – especially not since the incident at the Game Shop.

"Anyone in their right mind who had the option would still be in bed," Malik replied reasonably. "And you look like you're about to gnaw your way through a wall. What's going on?"

Bakura ceased his demented pacing abruptly and let his head hang heavily, his eyes narrowed and fixed on the floor.

"Something's not right," he ground out. Perplexed, Malik opened his mouth to ask for a more concise explanation when Bakura suddenly gave a hiss – not quite of pain but of something very near to it – and clutched at his chest with one claw-like hand. He looked like he was trying to gouge out his own heart.

"The...connection?" Malik wondered aloud before his insides were flooded with dread. "Is it Ryou?"

"Who else am I connected to?" Bakura snarled, crimson eyes cracking further open to scowl in his direction.

"Has something happened?" Malik asked nervously, ignoring the yami's irritable retort.

"I don't know," Bakura growled. "But something's...not right..."

"Is he ok?" Malik questioned, feeling his mouth go bone-dry. He swallowed with some difficulty.

"Why do you _always _ask me questions I don't know the answer to?" Bakura seethed, curling his bony fingers alternately into hooked claws and tight fists. "Seriously, it's like a _gift _you have."

"Don't start being a bastard to me just because you're worried too," Malik snapped, folding his arms. He'd tried his best, but he really didn't have much patience this early in the morning.

"If I'm being a bastard it's only because this damn _thing _woke me up about three hours ago," Bakura muttered venomously, looking slightly abashed.

"Three hours?" Malik repeated incredulously. "Shitting hell, Bakura, if you know something's not right, what are you still doing _here?_"

"What do you want me to do, march over to his apartment in the middle of the night?"

"It's morning now," Malik pointed out curtly. "You should probably get going."

"You say that like it's so simple," Bakura grumbled, jamming his hands in his jeans pockets (probably just to keep them still) and looking away from him.

"It's not exactly complicated."

"But it kind of is," Bakura insisted, gaze fixed moodily on the floor.

"Why?"

"Do you really need to ask?" he snapped. "This is _Ryou _we're talking about. You know, 'hates-my-guts' Ryou? Seeing me at the club every night pisses him off enough. If I showed up at his door at some ridiculous time..."

"...He'd hit you again," Malik finished for him. "Probably with the bat."

"Yeah."

There was a short silence.

"...I'm not scared," Bakura added after a moment.

"Sure."

"I'm not!" Bakura growled. "It's just...I don't know...it's easy enough to keep him safe in that creepy place. I know what I'm dealing with. But this time I don't know what's wrong and..."

"And you might not be able to help him," Malik said, once again completing the other's sentence.

"I wish you wouldn't say things like that, they sound really weird..." Bakura mumbled, turning away. "Anyway, why can't you go? He'd be happier to see you if something really is wrong."

"Because I have college," Malik said bluntly. In truth he wanted nothing more than to run like a flailing idiot over to the South side to make sure everything was ok (Bakura had unwittingly awakened his long-running, deep-set paranoia regarding Ryou's wellbeing), but he was still trying to force himself to take a back seat with these things. Ryou and Bakura needed to work things out. As experience had shown, his interference tended not to be helpful. "And anyway, it's you the connection's pulling at."

"Those are both terrible reasons," Bakura grumbled.

"Stop complaining," Malik ordered, shouldering his bag and grabbing an apple from the fruit bowl. When he had an early start to the day, that was the sort of thing he called 'breakfast'. "You said you wanted to help him, right? Show some conviction."

"You are no help whatsoever," Bakura informed him shortly.

"And you are wasting time," Malik retorted, leaving the apartment briskly and shutting the door behind him.

* * *

Bakura was almost embarrassed by how quickly he reached the familiar grime-encrusted tower block in South Domino.

Sighing irritably and shaking his head, he shoved his way past the perpetually broken front door and started to make his way up the stairs. He found himself facing Ryou's flaking green door all too soon. It had never looked so daunting.

Part of him wanted to just turn around and walk away.

But a much bigger part (a part of himself he still wasn't used to or familiar with) was shaken by that harrowing dream and the frenzied tugging of the reawakened connection, and that part was worried (fucking _worried!_) and insistent that he continued.

He sighed again, his forehead knitting into a deep frown. He didn't care what Malik said. Being human really _sucked. _

He studied the closed door intently, wondering how exactly he was supposed to get inside. It wasn't like he could just knock.

'_Open up, Ryou, it's your favourite person in the whole wide world and please don't get your bat or a knife or any other pointy implement-'_

Stupid.

He pulled out one of the many untwisted paperclips that still resided in his pocket. He liked to practice lock-picking when he got bored – it was an invaluable skill he had only picked up when in possession of Ryou's body, and one he was unwilling to lose. However, he wasn't sure how effective it would be in this situation. Since his first 'visit' to Ryou's apartment when he'd just returned to the world, the boy had probably installed about twenty locks, bolts and chains to prevent such an event reoccurring.

He supposed there was only one way to find out. Keeping one ear open for the sound of any potential witness on the stairwell, he slid the wire into the keyhole, manoeuvring it exactly as he had last time.

Nothing happened.

But not in a 'this lock has foiled you' sort of way.

Narrowing his eyes suspiciously, Bakura reached out and tried the handle. The door swung open.

_Ok, that's not good, he wasn't being __**serious **__when he said he sometimes left his door unlocked, was he? This kid is crazy, stupid, unhinged...Or something bad has happened here. Something bad and I wasn't brave enough to come in time to do anything about it-_

Shaking his head fiercely, he stepped into the poky apartment, shutting the door softly behind him.

There were no immediate signs of a break-in or a violent murder in the dark, windowless hallway. He supposed that was good.

"...Hey," he called out at length, doing his best to inject his voice with the kind of cold arrogance that he knew Ryou considered his trademark. "_Hey. _Anybody home? It's rude to ignore a guest."

For what felt like forever there was only silence, and he was tense and ready for a fight, expecting some hidden assailant to break their cover and fly at him any second. Then he heard a rustling noise, followed by the unmistakeable sound of footsteps.

A moment later, Ryou stepped out of a nearby room, which Bakura could only assume was his bedroom. He appeared unhurt and very much alive. He did not, in fact, look as if he were in any sort of peril at all, least of all that of the deadly variety.

Bakura felt a bizarre mix of still-jarring emotions jolt through him – a grudging kind of relief (he hadn't inadvertently gotten his light _killed _by waiting over three hours to check on him) and a very uncharacteristic feeling of awkwardness over the situation they were now in, along with a more tolerable burst of anger, aimed at their treacherous connection in the absence of a more tangible target. The damn thing had lied to him!

_And what am I supposed to do __**now?**_

Ryou blinked and looked at his darkness for a long time, not with surprise, exactly, but more as if he wasn't convinced that he was actually seeing him there. Bakura supposed it must seem like he had a death-wish or something.

"...What are you doing here?" Ryou asked finally. He didn't sound angry – not yet. In fact, he looked like he had just stumbled out of bed, which was quite probable considering the time. It seemed that not even Ryou could find the energy to be angry or hateful when he was still half-asleep.

"...I was bored," Bakura said with a shrug. "Thought I'd come bother you for a while."

Ryou rubbed at one of his eyes tiredly while still holding his gaze, frowning sceptically.

"It's like seven in the morning," he said. He looked as though he was gradually waking up properly, which presumably didn't mean anything good. Bakura saw his brown eyes flick to the side for a moment – turning to follow their brief line of vision, he saw the baseball bat leaning against the wall behind him, out of Ryou's reach. He breathed a silent sigh of relief.

"Did Malik finally kick you out or something?" Ryou asked, suspicion lurking in his tone. Bakura didn't particularly care if his light believed his slightly pathetic excuse for being here; he had now ascertained that, despite their connection going haywire, there was nothing wrong here and all he had to worry about was finding a way to leave with at least some of his dignity intact.

"No," he said shortly, trying hard to think of some way to change the subject. "Why wasn't your door locked?"

Ryou looked at him blankly for a moment.

"It was," he said at length, narrowing his eyes slightly. "Locked and chained."

"It was open," Bakura assured him.

"You're lying."

"Idiot," Bakura muttered. "I can pick locks, but I can't take chains off from the outside. If the chain had been on, I would have had to break it."

Sparing him one more eyes-narrowed glare (it seemed he'd officially woken up), Ryou shuffled over to the door, as if to inspect it for any kind of damage. Bakura huffed to himself and folded his arms, knowing he wouldn't find anything but also knowing that he still wouldn't believe him.

Ryou stumbled. He gasped audibly and only saved himself from a fall by throwing an arm out in front of him and managing to catch himself by leaning on the door. Bakura, who couldn't see anything that he could have tripped over, fought down a smirk.

"What the hell was that?" he asked, trying to keep the amusement out of his voice.

"Shut up," Ryou muttered, standing up straight again. He wobbled slightly on his feet. Even though he seemed wide awake (and ready for battle) now, he still sounded groggy. Bakura wondered if he was hungover again, but that didn't make much sense. After all, he'd been with him until the very early hours of the morning. Surely Ryou hadn't gone into his apartment and started drinking then...?

"Something's wrong with you," Bakura said with sudden certainty. Ryou looked at him over his shoulder, appearing unimpressed.

"Get out of my apartment," he said shortly, pointing to the door. As Bakura's eyes adjusted to the dim light of the hallway, he noticed that his light was eerily pale – to the extent that his usual pallor seemed almost normal by comparison. Ryou's dark eyes looked huge and stark in his ghostly white face.

"What's wrong with you?" Bakura asked, unnerved. He noticed too late that Ryou was now within reaching distance of that bat. Without warning the teen snatched it up and stood with both hands wrapped tightly around the handle, glowering at him.

"Get. Out," he repeated with a dangerous edge to his voice. Bakura growled lowly. Ryou was frighteningly volatile sometimes – it seemed to take nothing at all to bring out the anger and the violence in him.

"You know what?" he said bluntly. "I'm not going anywhere."

Ryou's scowl darkened and he swung the bat. It was clearly meant only as a warning, since it was never going to hit its mark, but Bakura shot forward and managed to grab hold of his wrists. Since both hands refused to relinquish their death-grip on the bat, Bakura found himself with no option but to pin his light against the nearest wall with his arms above his head.

"I had to put up with you until some ungodly hour this morning," he hissed, face inches from Ryou's, which appeared torn between scowling and just staring in dim surprise. "And then at some even _more _ungodly hour this morning, I got woken up because my little connection to you started going _apeshit. _So I dragged myself down to this shithole to see what the fucking problem is, and you can just _shut up _because I'm not leaving until I damn well find out what it is-!"

Ryou stared up at him dumbly. He looked nervous. At length he swallowed hard.

"It's...there's nothing..." he mumbled, looking away. Bakura was fully prepared to shake it out of him, when he started coughing. He started and it seemed like he couldn't stop. It seemed like he couldn't breathe very well, either. The bat suddenly slipped from his fingers. It struck Bakura's foot painfully before rolling across the floor, but he ignored it. His attention was taken up by Ryou's raw-sounding coughs and the fact that, he noticed for the first time, there were small beads of perspiration on his white face and forehead, making his bangs slightly damp.

"You're..." Bakura started in disbelief. "You're sick?"

Ryou's coughing started to lessen and he glared resentfully up at him with watering eyes, looking somewhat humiliated. The expression faded abruptly, however; his face became a mask of blank, muted horror.

"Let me go," he said, squirming against Bakura's hold. However, he wasn't as strong as Bakura at the best of times, and right now he seemed to lack any kind of strength at all.

"What, so you can pick up your damn bat?" Bakura said, rolling his eyes. "Yeah, I don't think-"

"Bakura, _let me go right now!_" Ryou practically screeched. The use of his name, more than the tone of extreme urgency, caught Bakura's attention. He frowned and looked more closely at Ryou's face. He realised what was going to happen a few lucky seconds before it actually did. With no further comment he released Ryou's arms and stepped back. The teen bolted into a room that could only be the bathroom, and almost immediately the less-than-melodic sound of vomit hitting toilet water floated around the semi-dark hallway.

"Heh...close one..." Bakura said out loud to himself, running a hand through his hair and letting out a nervous laugh he found himself unable to hold in. He was very aware that this was the second time in the space of a few weeks that someone had almost thrown up on him.

When Ryou eventually finished emptying his entire system (that sure was what it sounded like, anyway) and came back into the hallway on wobbly legs, Bakura was still wearing his slightly distant, dry smile.

"...What's funny?" Ryou asked dully, leaning against the doorframe and folding his arms over his stomach.

"Just thinking..." Bakura said wryly. "You're never lucky three times in a row...next time I really am going to get puked on..."

"...Huh?" Ryou said blankly, blinking slowly and with apparent effort.

"Never mind," Bakura said, shaking his head. "Guess what?"

"What?" Ryou replied without interest.

"You," Bakura said, approaching him with a smile that was just a bit too innocent, "Aren't going to work tonight."

Unsurprisingly, that caught Ryou's interest.

"Really?" he said, raising an eyebrow. "Says you?"

"Says me," Bakura confirmed with a pleasant nod.

Ryou snorted and shook his head.

"You really think it's up to you?" he said, a slow sneer spreading across his ashen face. "You don't know anything, and you can't tell me what to-"

"I saw this coming," Bakura admitted, taking his cell phone out of his pocket. Ryou looked vaguely surprised that he had such a thing. "So I figured, if you really think you can go to work later today, you're sick _and _delusional. Sounds like an emergency case, don't you think?"

He dialled '911' slowly and deliberately on the keypad and held the phone up for Ryou to see. He hovered his finger over the call button.

"You wouldn't," Ryou growled, but there was some genuine concern in his eyes.

"You really think so?" Bakura asked with a grin. "I think they'd be here pretty quickly. 'Oh God, please help...he's so sick, but he doesn't seem to know it...and he's getting _violent, _he has this _bat..._!'"

Ryou made a snatch for the phone. Bakura took the opportunity to grab him and throw him over his shoulder. Ryou made a pretty comical sound of outrage and pounded his fists against his back – hardly effectual, considering his weakened state.

"Put me down! _Put me down!_" he howled as Bakura ignored him completely, focusing on kicking the nearby door open. "Jerk! Bastard! Son of a-!"

"Woah, someone's got a dirty mouth today," Bakura said dryly. He found that the room Ryou had emerged from earlier was in fact a combined living room and bedroom. He dropped his light none-too-gently onto the bed. Of course, Ryou immediately tried to get back up but Bakura planted a hand in the centre of his chest and shoved him back down.

"Stay put," he said warningly.

Ryou was clearly about to argue, but just then his body was wracked by another fit of coughing, and by the time it was over he looked like he couldn't get up if he tried. He glowered up at Bakura with the promise of _vengeance _in his eyes.

"Go away," he ordered in a croaky voice.

"Relax, I'm not sticking around," Bakura said with a snort, taking his phone out again. "But it's not like I can leave you without a babysitter, is it? Someone's got to make sure you don't try to be some kind of bar-tending hero..."

"Shut up..." Ryou groaned, flopping back onto his pillow.

"Yeah, yeah..." Bakura said with boredom. "Trust me, I'll be out of here as quickly as I can. You can abuse Malik for the rest of the day."

He didn't see it, but Ryou froze.

"...What?" he asked with a tone of unmistakeable dread.

"...Malik," Bakura repeated, turning to look at him, puzzled by that scared-sounding word. "I'm sure he'll be glad for an excuse to ditch class today-"

"Don't call him," Ryou said, pushing himself into a half-sitting position. Bakura stared at him in disbelief.

"You're kidding, right?" he said after a moment, managing to find Malik's number in his phonebook. "It's not like he'll _mind-"_

"No, don't!" Ryou cried, shooting forward and succeeding in snatching the phone from Bakura's hand. A stunned silence followed, during which they just looked at each other – Bakura's expression suspicious and beyond confused and Ryou's just plain scared.

"...Alright," Bakura said at length, nodding. Ryou visibly relaxed. "But only if you tell me why it's so important that I don't."

Ryou shifted uncomfortably.

"I just don't like to bother him," he said with a shrug.

"Bull_shit_," Bakura spat, glaring. The vehemence of Ryou's reaction to the mere idea of calling Malik went beyond not wanting to be a bother. "If you really think I'm that stupid, I'm going to punch your lights out."

"It's none of your business," Ryou mumbled, eyes fixed on the bed-sheets. "It's nothing to do with you."

"Nothing to do with me?" Bakura repeated in a snarl. "I'm the one who's going to have to stay here and take shit from you all day if I can't call him. Somehow I don't think Aso has time to come over and keep an eye on you. And who else is there? I don't think there's _anyone _else who gives enough of a shit about you, and whose damn fault is that-?"

"Why are you even here?" Ryou demanded, his voice rising in fury despite his sickness. "All this talk of people giving a shit – you don't give a shit! Just go away and leave me alone! Why are you making such a mess of everything?"

Bakura glowered silently at him. He made to grab the phone back from Ryou, but the teen was quicker and threw it across the room, where it hit the wall and clattered to the floor. Bakura didn't particularly care if it was broken – securing a new one was easy enough – but _damn, _he was getting pissed with his light.

"Is it that stupid dying thing again?" he asked suspiciously. "Are you still so determined to find a way to kill yourself that isn't 'your fault'? You know you're sick but you're just going to keep working until-"

"No!" Ryou blurted out, shaking his head furiously and seeming to immediately regret it – he looked kind of dizzy. "No, it's not like that, it's not...!"

Bakura peered at him for a long moment.

"But Malik might think it is?" he questioned finally.

It didn't seem possible, but Ryou's face went even paler. Bakura nodded grimly. _Bingo._

"You can't tell him," his light said, sounding utterly desperate. "_Please, _don't..."

Bakura almost fell off the edge of the bed. 'Please'? From Ryou? To _him?_

"You're really serious about this, aren't you?" he said with a sigh.

"You don't know," Ryou said agitatedly. "You don't know _anything _about what happened before..."

"Of course I don't," Bakura snapped, getting to his feet. "It's not like anyone tells me anything."

He crossed the room and picked up his phone. At first it looked pretty dead, but after opening the back panel he found that the battery had just been knocked out of place, and the only real damage was a chipped corner. Still, he was angry. No one damaged the Thief King's property. (Except, occasionally, the Thief King himself.)

"...Are you going or what?" Ryou mumbled finally.

"Well I'm sure as hell not staying in here," Bakura retorted. "You are, though. And I'm going to be right outside."

"What?" Ryou asked through gritted teeth.

"I've signed myself up for sentry duty," Bakura said dully. "Whether you sleep or not is up to you, but you're not getting out of this room."

"You can't keep me prisoner in my own apartment," Ryou protested. "You can't even _be _in my apartment-!"

"Hey, _you _won't let me call for back-up," Bakura snarled. "So you don't get a say."

Ryou scowled murderously at him, but it faded surprisingly quickly – clearly due to exhaustion rather than lack of feeling.

"Fine," the teen said grudgingly, getting to his feet.

"Where are you going?" Bakura asked with a raised eyebrow.

"To get a basin," Ryou said acidly. "Since I'm not allowed out of my room."

He stomp-shuffled to the kitchen, muttering something about being treated like an eight year-old, leaving a perplexed-looking Bakura behind him.

"..._Oh, _in case you need to puke again," Bakura said in eventual realisation. "Gods, I keep forgetting how disgusting it is to be human."

* * *

Despite his almost overwhelming urge to do a U-turn towards South Domino, Malik managed to get himself safely seated in one of the college's largest lecture halls. He and his two hundred fellow students were now waiting for the professor to start.

He chewed anxiously on the end of his pen. He had a break between this class and the next one. Maybe he'd be able to get in touch with Bakura and find out what was up. The suspense was hard to bear, because when it came to South Domino, a problem could easily range from a false fire alarm to a drive-by shooting.

The ageing professor finally managed to switch on the electronic projector, and the first slide loomed large on the big screen at the front of the hall. Malik suppressed a groan but allowed himself a heavy sigh. They were still wading their way through the stress chapter of the physiological psychology unit – which was proving to be his least favourite chapter of his least favourite unit. He often felt the urge to complain 'I didn't sign up for this!' but was resignedly aware that every subject had areas that were less interesting than others, and the only solution was to memorise whatever you needed to pass and then immediately forget it all.

He was going to cut himself some slack today, though. The last thing he needed to be taught about today was stress.

He flicked absently through his textbook, pausing when he reached the section on infant development. They hadn't officially reached that part yet, but he'd read some of the case studies and got to grips with the basics. It...interested him.

Sometimes he wondered what would happen if he submitted his own cute little life story as a case study, just to break the pattern of twins separated at birth and kids finding cold comfort in soft toys while their parents were absent. _The case of the Ishtar family, recorded by Ishtar, et al. Three children raised in an underground crypt to serve a king who died 3000 years ago. Youngest child shows signs of __**mental abnormality**_**, **_supposedly stemming from an incident wherein his father gave him a pat on the back with a carving knife when he was ten years old. Showed definite __**control freak **__symptoms throughout early adolescence. Did not learn about __**the birds and the bees **__until very late in his development, and thus now struggles with the idea of any more-than-platonic relationship – and ooh, wouldn't Freud just love to get his teeth into that one._

Malik almost laughed.

Almost. Not quite.

* * *

Sentry-duty got old pretty quickly.

Behind the closed bedroom door, Ryou was being very quiet, but Bakura didn't think he was sleeping. He could hear him shuffling around every so often, and sometimes caught a snatch of his breathing – not the deep, slow breathing of a sleeper. Most likely he was staying awake by sheer force of will, and mainly out of spite. But whatever. Presumably he couldn't do himself much damage in there, and at the very least, he hadn't thus far had to use the basin.

Then he stopped being quiet.

The coughing started again – that deep, wracking cough that sounded like it would break his ribs and snap his windpipe if it didn't stop. It sounded worse than before. Harsher, more wheezy. Painful. It sounded like it _really hurt._

And then it stopped.

_Everything_ stopped.

Bakura stood very still, hardly daring to breathe himself as he strained to hear something – _anything – _from the other side of the door. There was silence. A thick, ugly silence that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. No shuffling, no breathing. Just nothing. Hesitantly, he reached out and pushed the door open.

Ryou was on the bed, lying on his side in a half-curled foetal position. For the longest and most horrible moment Bakura felt his heart stop, his gut twinge. Because Ryou was the very picture of death, lying there, pale and still and so very, very quiet. But the moment ended, and Bakura saw that his light's chest (with ribs poking out even through his t-shirt, he noticed) was rising and falling in shallow, silent breaths. That wasn't _good, _but it was something.

Bakura knew (just _knew_) that Ryou hadn't simply fallen asleep, though. That fit of coughing had drained the last dregs of his energy and ripped him from consciousness. Sleeping was peaceful and free from pain. Ryou's face was anything but.

Bakura was undecided only for a moment.

"I'd ask you to forgive me for this..." he muttered as he pulled his phone from his pocket. "But that would be kind of pointless."

* * *

_**Happy New Year, folks :) Look who decided to update kind of fast for the first time in her life! It's because you're all so special.**_

_**BAKURA VS BAT, ROUND 2! D: It's weird, but I love the fact that Bakura is now living in fear of getting puked on xD**_

_**A huge thank you to Affy-Bakura, SkaleFlapper15, schoolkid, MissPessimist, Tender Loving Care, LibraMoon, SHADOWoftheFOX, MaaTheDinosaur, Stray Neko, Bokmal14, HeartShapedLocket, chibi heishi, pride1289, Junki, Neko, PurpleWildcat2010, Strawberry Ashes, Seto K4iba1, bansheegrrl, haku fan1, KATZUNITED-MEOW-, Holly-Sempai, Callette, sunokofairytale, ani, Calm Envy, A Soul Alone, Twilight-Imp-626, Chibi Kafka, ACE329, Teddy syn, Kathrine, Schizo-of-Destiny, ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry bomb, earthluva, Innocent Demon, Hellion16, safa'at keruth, xluluxlunax, Yosenity, TexasDreamer01, Obnoxious Celtic guardian, Persee, Thief Mistress Thorn, LadyBlackwell, BattleGoddess126, Harutemu, IceDragon1095, VampirePrinssess and Darksouled Saiyanphoenix. You guys don't need any New Year's Resolutions, you're way awesome already :)**_

_**Extra thanks again to LadyBlackwell for another awesomely helpful beta job :D (I FIXED ALL MY ERROR #1'S WHEEEE) And also thanks to safa'at keruth for helping with grammar! **_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x **_


	23. Breaking Promises

_**Chapter 23: Breaking Promises**_

Unlike Bakura, Malik had never inadvertently set his cell phone's volume to its blaring maximum. But when his phone suddenly started ringing in the middle of the extremely quiet lecture hall, it still managed to sound _pretty loud. _

The professor singled him out with a disapproving frown and the other students chortled at his expense as he searched frantically through his bag for the noisy device. When he finally found it (after what felt like _forever_), he immediately hit the 'ignore' button – but not before noticing that the incoming call had been from Bakura. A ripple of panic immediately went through him.

Fortunately, the disturbance had caused the professor to break from his seemingly endless drone and glance at the clock.

"On that note, I think we'll finish up for today," he announced, casting another stern glance in Malik's direction. Everyone else breathed a sigh of relief and hastily shoved their notebooks away, eager to escape.

"Five minutes early," a boy to Malik's left grinned. "Nice one, Ishtar."

Malik blinked, surprised that one of his classmates actually knew who he was, before managing a weak smile. He didn't hang around, though, or attempt to strike up any kind of conversation. He had a phone-call to make.

He hurried from the room, phone in hand, and it was ringing before he'd even made it out of the building. Bakura answered _very _quickly, which only added to Malik's rising worry.

"_Fucking hell, Malik, why didn't you answer?" _Bakura demanded by way of greeting.

"I was in class," Malik replied. He knew he should feel at least a little indignant, but the noticeable anxiety in Bakura's voice prevented him from quite managing it. "What's wrong?"

"_He's sick and I don't know what to do about it," _Bakura replied in a growl. Normally he was pretty reluctant to admit when he didn't know something, but right now he sounded too panicked to care about a little thing like his pride. _"I mean, when I got here he was looking shitty and throwing up and I could __**deal with that, **__but now he's...I don't know, __**unconscious**__-!"_

"...Ryou's sick?" Malik questioned, starting to feel nauseous himself.

"_**Yes!**__ Gods, weren't you __**listening**__? I don't know __**anything **__about this shit, do I call an ambulance or do I-?"_

"Don't do anything," Malik said shortly. "I'll be right there."

He ended the call before Bakura could even reply.

* * *

Bakura did not like feeling helpless.

He wasn't _used _to feeling helpless. For the past three millennia or so, all the problems he'd encountered could be solved with the use of his knife, a duel disk or the occasional burst of Shadow Magic.

Now, he realised, he was in the _real world _where there were _real problems_ and he _did not like it._

Ryou still hadn't moved. Bakura, at a loss about what else to do, had taken to pacing the apartment, swearing colourfully and kicking doors as he went. He didn't bother about being quiet. If he woke Ryou up with his stomping, he would count that as a personal triumph over adversity.

He paused long enough to glare at his light's sleeping (_unconscious_) form.

"...Don't you _dare _die," he growled. "If you die, I swear I'll...kill you."

He groaned aloud at how stupid that had sounded before resuming his pacing.

After what felt like forever, he heard footsteps (_fast _footsteps) from the nearby stairwell, and then someone, who could only be Malik, was pounding the apartment door so hard that Bakura half-expected a fist to come crashing through the paint-flaking wood. Before Bakura could even reach the door to open it, Malik tried the handle himself and came storming inside. Bakura was too relieved to see him to really notice the odd look on his face.

"That was quick," he remarked, glancing at the time on his phone. It hadn't _felt _quick, but according to the clock Malik had got here in record time.

"Called a cab," the blond replied shortly. "Ryou still...asleep?"

"He was still out last time I looked," Bakura confirmed. _Like, five seconds ago. Yeah._

Malik marched into the living room without another word. Since he didn't ask where Ryou was, Bakura assumed he'd been here before. He wondered how long it had been since Malik had last visited this place, though. Ever since he'd got back, there had never been any _question _of Malik visiting Ryou.

He followed Malik through the doorway and found him staring at the bed with an unnervingly blank expression. Bakura tried to imagine how the scene appeared through his eyes – the eyes of someone who hadn't seen Ryou in a while, and who definitely hadn't seen him conscious earlier-

"Couldn't you at least have put a blanket or something over him?" Malik said finally, shooting Bakura a baleful glance.

"...Oh," Bakura said lamely. "Yeah."

Malik sighed exasperatedly and strode over to the sofa, tugging the colourful throw off of it in one quick movement. Bakura couldn't help but raise his eyebrows at the state of the sofa underneath. The fabric was soiled and stained, and the cushions and the back had tears in them that looked too big and too numerous to have been accidental.

"This..." he started uncertainly, coming forward and placing a hand gingerly on the top of one of the cushions. "This is the same one he had before. Back when I was in the Ring. What the hell did he _do _to it...?"

"You're wondering about the couch?" Malik said scathingly as he draped the throw over Ryou's still form. "Seriously?"

Bakura jerked his hand back as if it had been burnt, suddenly feeling moronic under Malik's piercing, irritable gaze. He felt like a child that had just been scolded – a sensation he was decidedly unfamiliar with.

"So what happened?" Malik asked in clipped tones. "When you got here."

"I told you already," Bakura muttered, raking a hand through his hair. "He just...didn't look right. Too pale. Unsteady on his feet. Just kind of out of it. Then he was coughing, and then he was sick, then...hn. More coughing. Then when I looked in, he was out cold."

"...When you looked in?" Malik repeated. He sounded like he was speaking through gritted teeth. "You left him alone?"

"You think he would let me stay in the same room as him?" Bakura said defensively. "I was right outside, it was the best I could do-"

"Wow, he really is calling the shots these days, isn't he?" Malik said coldly. "Even when he's sick enough to _pass out, _he can still tell you what to do...?"

It was around that moment that Bakura realised (and he should have realised sooner) that something was really wrong. Something much worse than Ryou being sick and Malik being worried. He supposed he'd been so relieved just to see Malik (Malik, who had the answers to everything, who could fix everything) that he hadn't immediately noticed...this. Whatever it was. But it was _something _and it was something _bad _because this wasn't the Malik he knew now – the Malik he lived with wasn't like this. Cold and angry and spitting cruel remarks. This wasn't even Battle City Malik. This was a stranger.

"What's wrong...?" Bakura started to ask apprehensively.

"Why didn't you call me right away?" Malik demanded, narrowing his eyes. "Don't even _pretend _you know what to do with a sick person-"

"I _wanted _to call you," Bakura growled, folding his arms. "He didn't want me to. Wouldn't let me."

The silence was so sudden, so complete, that it almost seemed to ring ominously. Bakura felt an icy stab of foreboding. _I did it again. I said something I shouldn't have, I've opened the world's biggest, slimiest can of worms-_

"Call...call that guy," Malik said quietly at length, turning away from him. "The one from the club. Tell him Ryou won't be working today. Or for a while. I don't know how long, exactly."

"...Why didn't he want me to call you?" Bakura dared to ask. "He wouldn't say why, he-"

"Just make the stupid phone-call," Malik said acidly, cutting him off. He still didn't look at him.

Bakura twisted his mouth from side to side (out of a new, strange kind of anxiety as much as from annoyance) and didn't question him any further. He pulled out his phone to call Kazuma for the second time ever. The idiot had practically snatched the phone from him the day he'd got it and put his number into the contacts list, 'in case of emergencies'. Bakura had never thought he'd actually have to use it.

"_Touzoku!" _Kazuma typically greeted him when he answered. _"This is the second time you've called me up now, man! I definitely smell a bromance brewing..."_

"Shut up," Bakura said shortly, even less in the mood for his banter than usual. "Listen. Ryou's not going to be working tonight."

"_...Why not? You guys going on a date?"_

"He's sick," Bakura snarled. "Isn't that why most people call in?"

"_Woah, is he ok?" _Kazuma asked, sounding alarmed. _"I __**thought **__he wasn't looking so great recently. Or, y'know...ever. Wait, how bad must it be that he's letting __**you **__call in for him...?"_

"He's sleeping just now," Bakura ground out, feeling the beginning of a headache blooming in his temples already. "I don't think he's going to be back for a while."

"_Man, I dunno what's going on over there, but keep him home for as long as you can, ok?" _Kazuma said. _"Kid's a wreck. I'm no doctor, but I've seen stray dogs in better health. If it's finally got bad enough that even __**he's **__taking notice, use it to your full advantage. Or his full advantage. Whatever. What I mean is, keep him home and make him eat something!"_

"I'm not his nurse, you know," Bakura said dryly. He winced and held the phone away from his ear when Kazuma burst into raucous laughter.

"_Aw man, wouldn't that be cute?" _he guffawed. _"Your bedside manner wouldn't be worth shit..."_

Bakura rolled his eyes and hung up without another word.

"I think he got the message," he said dully. "Though you can never be too sure with that guy."

Malik nodded curtly but otherwise didn't respond. He was biting the thumbnail on his left hand – a habit Bakura had never seen him display before. It was only a little thing (_such _a little thing), but it didn't help his already stirring unease.

"You've got to tell me what the deal is here," Bakura said at length. "_Clearly _I don't know the half of it. And how am I supposed to help if-?"

"Help?" Malik repeated with a short, staccato bark of laughter. "You want to help?"

"Of course I want to help," Bakura growled, hating having to say it out loud. He'd been under the impression that they'd established that much a while ago now. Malik gave another harsh laugh.

"Careful, he might hear you," he said sneeringly, pointing to Ryou. "Couldn't have that, could we? Couldn't have you two fucking communicating for once."

Bakura's hands were clenched so tightly into fists that his fingers were starting to hurt. He was doing everything in his power not to lose it, because it was clear that Malik was teetering on the edge of losing it. Maybe he'd lost it already – Bakura couldn't tell. He didn't know what Malik looked like nowadays when he flew off the handle. But something was wrong with him because he was biting his nails and snapping at him every two seconds and now he'd started spouting off the f-word, which (Bakura was dimly surprised to realise he knew) Malik refrained from using unless a situation was _really screwing with him._

"Tell me what's wrong," Bakura snarled. "I don't care if it's something you think I don't 'deserve' to know. I'm caught up in this shit now, so just _tell me_."

"Don't feel like you're out the loop or anything," Malik said absently, holding a hand over Ryou's forehead and frowning. Bakura wondered if that was bad. "There is no loop. I told you before that some things are just between me and Ryou. They're not all good things."

Bakura was suddenly aware of a feeling of sick dread rising in his stomach. For a moment he didn't know the reason for it, but then he realised: this scene was horribly familiar. Ryou lying sleeping (_knocked out unconscious so so tired) _and Malik hovering over him, keeping watch. Only last time, Bakura hadn't _seen _it happen, as such. He'd only been _aware _of it. Because he'd been part of it.

"...I had another one of those weird dreams," he ventured, watching Malik's face for a reaction. "Just before the connection woke me up."

"First the sofa, now your weird dreams," Malik said cuttingly, not even looking up. "Your list of priorities is incredible today."

"You were in it," Bakura went on, ignoring him. It wasn't really Malik talking, anyway. "I could hear you. Well, Ryou could hear you. Same thing when I'm dreaming."

Malik's head revolved slowly to look at him, his expression guarded and his eyes suspicious.

"I think he was sick, in this dream," Bakura said, indicating to Ryou. "I don't know when it was, exactly. All I know is that he was _tired. _It was crushing him. He could hear you and you were telling him to wake up, or to let you know that he could hear you. You sounded scared. And he was almost scared, but he was too tired to _really _be scared. He thought he was going to die and he was so tired that he didn't even care very much-"

"Stop it," Malik said shrilly. His fingers twitched, as if he wanted to put his hands over his ears or face but knew that doing so would be futile.

"So what happened?" Bakura persisted. "Was he sick? But he must have got better, right? And you took care of him then, so why didn't he want me to call you this time?"

"...He really told you not to phone me?" Malik asked quietly. He seemed calmer suddenly, but not himself. An odd, brittle sort of calm. The kind of glazed-over look a hunted rabbit takes on when it's so scared that it can't even run for its life anymore for fear.

"He was _pretty insistent_," Bakura reiterated. "Why?"

"These dreams you have are pretty disgusting," Malik said darkly, as if he hadn't heard. "Why do you see those things? Who decided that was ok? Not Ryou, for sure. We locked that thing up, me and him. It was supposed to be dead and buried." He paused, swallowing hard. "Do you...think you had that dream because it's going to happen again...?"

"Whatever 'it' is?" Bakura said irritably. "I don't know. Maybe. Seems like it's something you wouldn't be happy to know about. Guess that could be why he didn't want you to find out."

Apparently this was the wrong answer. Malik went so pale that Bakura was briefly concerned that he'd shortly be dealing with two sick people, with no one to call for back-up. He reached out and grabbed Ryou's shoulder, giving it a shake.

"Wake up," he said in a strained voice. "Ryou. _Wake up_."

"Malik, he's totally out of it..." Bakura started to say before noticing that, under Malik's insistent nudging, Ryou did appear to be stirring. "Oh. I'm not sure if this is a good thing or not."

Ryou blinked a few times, looking puzzled to find himself under the throw, and then even more puzzled by the hand on his shoulder. Looking up to find its owner, all expression drained from his face. He looked like he'd just woken up into a bad dream instead of from one.

"Malik," he said faintly.

"You're sick," Malik said accusingly.

"I..." Ryou started feebly before crumbling under Malik's gaze and looking away. His eyes instead found Bakura, who had long since come to the realisation that he was going to swing for this. "You. I should've known you'd..."

"Would you have preferred that he called an ambulance?" Malik asked icily.

The dog-with-its-tail-between-its-legs look on Ryou's face suggested that the answer to that might actually have been 'yes'.

"How long?" Malik demanded.

"W-what?" Ryou asked nervously. He sounded like he needed to cough. Bakura suspected he was too scared to.

"How long have you been sick?" Malik elaborated. His dangerous tone suggested that he would not accept a lie, or even a rough estimation.

"I...I don't..." Ryou started before a few sputtering coughs jumped out of him. He slapped a hand over his mouth, trying to fight them down.

"...You were coughing like that when you came to the Game Shop that day," Malik said slowly. "Back in _November._"

"Malik, please, it's not the same as before," Ryou said pleadingly. "Honest. It's not like that at all. It's just-"

"If it's not like _before_, then why didn't you want me to know about it?" Malik interrupted shortly. Bakura winced inwardly when Ryou shot him another searing glare.

"Because...because I knew you'd react like _this_," he muttered, looking annoyed instead of just cowed for the first time. "I knew you'd-"

He never got to finish, because just then Malik's hand shot out and smacked him soundly across the face – with some considerable force, if the startlingly loud sound of impact and the way Ryou's head jerked around to the side were any indication.

"You knew I'd _what? _You knew I'd _give a shit _and try to do something about it?" Malik hissed, looking more furious than seemed possible for his normally calm persona. "Is that just too painful for you and your pathetic independence? Seriously, just...fuck you."

On that note, he turned and stormed out of the room. Bakura stared after him with the same blank, my-mind-has-just-been-blown expression he'd been wearing from the moment the scene had descended into physical violence.

Ryou didn't even bother scowling at him or screaming at him. He just sat there, one hand covering his undoubtedly throbbing cheek, staring out blankly at nothing. It was horrible and Bakura wished he _would _just yell at him. It might have made him feel better.

After a few moments Bakura decided he had to do something or he might go as crazy as everyone else in the apartment, so he went to look for Malik. He found him in the kitchen, pacing back and forth with one hand fisted in his own hair.

"You...you hit him," Bakura blurted out stupidly. "You _actually _hit him."

"...Yeah. I did," Malik agreed, halting mid-pace.

"Why?"

"He made me _mad_," Malik said bluntly. "Keeping a promise means _actually _keeping it, not just hoping the person you made the promise to doesn't find out you're breaking it. Even you know that, right?"

"What are you talking about?" Bakura asked wearily.

"...Later," Malik said distantly, pulling his phone out of his bag and starting to punch buttons. "Not now. Just...later."

"And what are you doing now...?" Bakura asked warily, wondering if he really would call an ambulance just out of spite. Malik didn't answer – just held up a finger for quiet as he pressed the phone to his ear.

"...Jou, hi," he said after a moment. "Listen...I need a favour."

* * *

Meanwhile, completely unaware of the situation unfolding in a certain apartment in the south side of Domino, two elderly women were sitting on a bench in the nearby park, throwing bread to the ducks in the pond. The park was quiet at this time of the morning, especially on a weekday. Most people were at work or school, and those who weren't generally considered ten-thirty A.M. to be rather early for a trip to the park, particularly when there was a light sheen of frost dusted over the grass.

But early rising seems to come with old age, so these two didn't feel like it was too early to be here. And in any case, they liked the quiet. It was good for thinking, and remembering.

They were vaguely aware of a young man wandering around nearby. At the moment he was crouched down at the water's edge on the frost-hardened ground, gazing silently at the dark water and the ducks squabbling over scraps of bread. A little odd, certainly, but the women didn't mind. He wasn't bothering them. He just stayed quiet and kept himself to himself.

However, all of a sudden he jumped, as if he'd just received an electric shock. He got to his feet, looking bewildered.

"Ow," he said in surprise, blinking. One hand went to the left side of his chest.

"...Are you alright, dear?" one woman asked him, pushing her glasses up her nose to see him better. Now that he wasn't merely hovering on the periphery of their vision, they took in his appearance properly for the first time; his dark skin, an array of spiked blond hair and, perhaps most notably, the dark purple cloak draped over his shoulders, which appeared to be his only protection from the cold. (The women pondered this only briefly, however – they'd long since given up on trying to keep up with fashion trends among the youth.)

He looked over at them, appearing surprised to have been addressed. He opened his mouth to reply but, before he could, his expression morphed into a pained wince. The second woman took note of his hand, still pressed pointedly against his chest.

"Heartburn?" she ventured with a faintly nervous smile. She didn't know what she'd do if it was anything more serious than that. Medical emergencies were not her forte.

The young man blinked at her before giving a slow, puzzled-looking smile.

"Heartburn?" he repeated. "Is that what it's called?"

They weren't sure how to respond to that, so they didn't.

"Ow. Omote, that _hurts_," he muttered, walking past them and away in what appeared to be the general direction of the park's southern gate. "What's wrong, what's wrong? Why are you so upset? Why does it hurt so much...?"

He soon disappeared from sight, leaving two very bemused old ladies in his wake.

"Strange boy," the first remarked, throwing her last crust of bread to the waiting ducks.

"Yes," her companion agreed. "He seemed nice enough, though."

* * *

Bakura had never thought in a million years that he'd ever be glad to see Katsuya Jounouchi, but he couldn't deny the copious relief he felt when the apartment door burst open again and the loud-mouthed moron himself came whirlwinding inside, instantly dispelling the almost unbearable tension that had spread from wall to wall ever since Malik had made his phone-call and then refused to say another word.

"Malik," he gasped out, falling into an undignified half-crouch with his hands on his knees. Clearly he'd just run all the way up the stairs. "Doctor's on his way, ok? Now break it to me, I can take it. Just tell me he's not dead, huh?"

"Of course he's not dead," Malik said blandly. His eyes had taken on a vague, far-away look which Bakura whole-heartedly hoped Jounouchi could get rid of. "I wouldn't have asked you for a _doctor _if he was dead."

"Well, that's something, I guess," Jou said with a sigh of relief, standing up straight again. He looked more serious than Bakura had seen him since returning to the world. "But is he ok? Is it bad?"

"I..." Malik started, stopped, swallowed, tried again. "I don't know."

Jounouchi looked at him worriedly, clearly not liking his catatonic expression any more than Bakura did. He looked ready to ask more questions, but just then a cheerful electronic tune (which Bakura now easily recognised as a cell phone ringtone) trilled from his pocket. Jou pulled his phone out and glanced at it.

"Doctor's here," he said. "I'm gonna go get him. Make sure he gets the right apartment, y'know?"

He bounded off, obviously full of excess nervous energy.

"...I don't get it," Bakura muttered when he was gone. "Last I heard, that idiot and Kaiba hated each other. How come he can suddenly call in all these favours...?"

"You really don't get it?" Malik said dully, glancing up at him. "Seriously?"

Bakura stared back at him for a moment, feeling lost, and then all of a sudden he _did _get it. He was mortified to feel his face burn.

"Oh," he mumbled, looking away.

A moment later, Jounouchi reappeared with a stern-looking middle-aged man in tow. Presumably, this was the Kaiba Corp private doctor. All expenses paid.

"Hey Malik, where's Ryou?" Jounouchi asked.

"Through here," Malik said quietly, leading the way. The doctor followed; Bakura didn't. He figured he was in enough trouble, and he didn't think Ryou would take too kindly to him sitting in on the examination, which he would no doubt consider a highly humiliating experience. And over and above that, he wasn't sure he wanted to see Ryou's reaction to the very _presence _of a doctor. It was unlikely to be good.

This, of course, meant he was left alone in the hallway with Jounouchi. That wasn't a great situation for Bakura to find himself in at any time, but right now it just seemed cruel – right now when he already felt drained with stress despite the early hour, and when he felt like he might never see Jounouchi in the same light ever again.

"...You gonna fill me in or what?" Jou piped up suddenly, addressing him for the first time. "What's going on?"

"...He's sick," Bakura said plainly.

"Yeah, no _shit_," Jounouchi said, rolling his eyes. "But I'm _guessing _he doesn't just have a cold. Malik sounded so freaked on the phone, I thought he was gonna tell me he needed me to come kick someone's ass. Like, yours or Mariku's."

"Look, I don't know what's going on either," Bakura snapped, glowering at him. "All I know is that he's sick. I don't know what's wrong with him and I don't know why Malik's throwing such a fit about it. I thought _you _might know."

"Can't say I do," Jounouchi said, scratching at his head and looking aggravated. "Damn, I need a coffee. Think Ryou would mind if I raided his kitchen?"

"Probably," Bakura said dryly, not really surprised when the blond proceeded to do so anyway.

"You want some?" Jou called through, finding the cupboards with the mugs. "Do former evil spirits drink coffee?"

"Shut up," was Bakura's only come-back. He was just too damn tired to put up a decent fight. Lack of sleep and the unexpected trauma of the morning (so far) were making him feel closer to his _actual _age than his physical age.

"Whatever," Jounouchi scoffed, shovelling at least two spoonfuls of instant coffee and about five of sugar into a mug. "Man, I haven't even had breakfast yet. And there's _no food _here. What's that about? What the heck does Ryou eat?"

"Not much, apparently," Bakura said dully, coming over to lean against the kitchen doorframe.

"No wonder he's sick. I'm starting to feel sick already. I'd kill for a bagel, you know that?"

"Will you _stop_ talking shit?" Bakura growled, thumping his forehead against the doorframe – as if this would somehow help.

"Sorry," Jou said, looking at him oddly. "You worried?"

"No," Bakura snapped. Unfortunately, at that exact moment, a small explosion of noise erupted from the nearby living room (it sounded suspiciously like Ryou making some kind of protest and Malik yelling at him, in very choice words, to cut it out) and Bakura's head snapped around so fast that it kind of hurt his neck.

"Woah. That was convincing," Jou snorted.

Bakura just sneered at him and turned away. (After all, it wasn't like there was much he could really say to that.)

"...Hey," he said grudgingly after a few moments of silence, broken only by Jounouchi slurping on his coffee. "Did he get sick before? While I was gone."

"Hm? Oh, yeah. That was years ago now," Jounouchi said with a blink. "Not long after you and Atemu disappeared. I mean, I'm sure he's been sick again since then – everyone gets colds and stuff – but that's the one I remember. Why?"

"I dunno," Bakura said, shrugging and doing his utmost to hide his burning curiosity. "That seemed to be part of the reason why Malik got so crazy. Maybe he thinks it's the same thing again. Was it bad?"

"Why didn't you just ask Malik?" Jou asked, looking perplexed.

"...I did. He won't talk about it."

"Seriously? Man, I didn't know it was meant to be a secret," Jou said, shaking his head and downing the last of his coffee. "It was pretty bad, I guess. Ryou was off school a long while. I forget exactly how long – I just remember that it was long enough that I got _used _to him not being there. And then he didn't graduate, but you probably knew that."

Bakura nodded stiffly – though he hadn't known that. What was it Malik had told him? That Ryou's grades hadn't been good as he'd expected? That was a funny way of saying that he'd failed to graduate.

"I think it was just a real nasty virus or something, though. Don't see why that would give Malik such a heart attack," Jou went on with a shrug.

Bakura was silent. He was remembering the somewhat cryptic remark Malik had made while Ryou had still been out cold.

_Don't feel like you're out the loop or anything. There is no loop. I told you before that some things are just between me and Ryou. _

Jounouchi couldn't fill in the blanks for him, because he didn't know everything. Everyone else knew that Ryou had been sick. But Malik knew something else. Something bad, something dark. Something just between him and Ryou. Something they'd locked up – and maybe now it was creeping out again.

Bakura felt uneasy again. He didn't doubt that he'd find the missing piece to this riddle eventually. He just wasn't sure that he particularly wanted to.

* * *

"...Well?" Malik asked once the doctor had quite finished poking, prodding and peering at Ryou. He'd been gnawing his thumbnail the whole time and it was seriously starting to hurt.

"Well," the doctor said briskly. "I diagnose a bad case of carelessness and stupidity."

These words were met with a stunned silence.

"What?" Malik asked finally whilst Ryou just sat simmering resentfully.

"How old are you, Ryou?" the doctor asked, ignoring Malik's question and Ryou's baleful stare.

"Nineteen," came the sour reply.

"And how long have you been living alone?"

"...A while. Since high school."

"I never would have guessed," the doctor said dryly. "Evidently you haven't learned even the basics of taking care of yourself in that time."

"Evidently," Malik agreed stonily. Ryou looked as though he had been set to argue this point, but one look from the blond shut him up. "Could you put us out of our misery, please? What's wrong with him? Apart from being stupid."

"First of all, Ryou, you have a chest infection," the doctor started brusquely, peering over his glasses to read some notes he'd scribble down. "It's the sort of thing that can normally be cleared up with a course of very _mild _antibiotics. However, you've let it go untreated for so long that it's become more...severe. Listening to your lungs is like listening to a broken air-con system. Honestly, didn't you notice _something _was wrong? For future reference, if you're struggling to _breathe, _that generally means something is wrong."

Ryou said nothing.

"Also, the yearly winter bug is still going around. It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if you've caught it – it would explain the vomiting and your poor pallor. I'm afraid there's nothing you can do except let the virus run its course. You're in for a fun week or so – it's a particularly unpleasant one this year. Headaches, fever, more vomiting – the works."

"Wonderful," Ryou muttered.

"I normally recommend a period of fasting until the bug starts to leave the system," the doctor went on, disregarding the acerbic interjection. "But that brings us to point number three. You're severely underweight. I don't even have to weigh you to know that. Do you know the difference between malnourished and undernourished?"

"No," Ryou said testily.

"Good, because it doesn't matter. You're both," the doctor informed him bluntly. "Your eating-habits must be appalling. It is my _professional opinion _that you are not competent enough to continue living alone. I suggest you get in touch with your parents or guardians and move back in with them until you learn some common sense."

"That isn't an option," Ryou said quietly, looking away.

"...I see," the doctor said blandly. Clearly, working for Kaiba had taught him not ask pointless questions. It wasn't an option. Period. No point in digging for details as to why.

"In any case, you're going to need keeping an eye on," the man continued. "Both while you recover _and _afterwards."

"Believe me, I'm going to be here," Malik said shortly, shooting Ryou a look that just _dared _him to argue.

"Fine. In that case, you come with me. I'll leave you in charge of the prescription." The doctor placed everything he'd brought with him back inside his case, closed it and got to his feet before pointing a finger at Ryou. "_You, _get some rest. You're going to need it."

He swept from the room without another word. As he followed, Malik wondered if working for Kaiba caused people to slowly start morphing into him.

He frowned uncertainly when the doctor exited the apartment without even pausing in his steps, waving an impatient hand over his shoulder to indicate that Malik was still meant to be following. He did so, ignoring Bakura's questioning look from the kitchen doorway.

"...Where are we going?" Malik dared to ask as they reached the ground floor and stepped out into the chilly February air.

"Out of earshot," the doctor replied frankly. "And call me a snob, but I wasn't hanging around in that disease-trap of a stairwell to write out prescriptions."

"Out of earshot...?" Malik repeated pensively. He hadn't been aware that the medical profession had become so very cloak-and-dagger.

"Step into the car, please," the doctor said crisply, opening the door to the sleek black company car he'd arrived in. Malik obeyed, sliding gingerly over the leather seats, which looked like they alone could have cost more than he had earned in a year (back when he had still been earning). Funny how the 'don't get into a stranger's car' rule didn't apply when the stranger was a doctor.

"Right," the doctor said, getting inside and pulling the door closed. "Malik, yes?"

"Yes."

"Alright, listen carefully, Malik," he said almost sternly, reminding Malik of one of the stricter teachers at college. "Your friend has pneumonia. Now, it's not a-"

"He has _what?_" Malik blurted out, staring at the man with blank horror. "That's...you said he had a chest infection! No, that's...oh Gods, that's bad, that's _really bad_, it...he needs to go to a hospital-!"

"I think I'll be the judge of that," the doctor said dryly. "If you would let me finish. It's not a _severe _form of the disease. He displays many of the symptoms for community-acquired pneumonia, or 'walking pneumonia'. So named because eighty percent of sufferers do not require hospitalisation. Please calm down."

"So..." Malik swallowed hard. "So he's not going to die?"

The doctor blinked, clearly bemused. But he also hesitated.

"Do people die from this thing?" Malik asked desperately, already knowing the answer in his heart.

"...Yes, it can be fatal. _But, _in the great majority of cases, fatality outcomes occur with infants, the elderly or those with underlying health problems. Does your friend have an underlying health problem?"

"...No."

"Is he elderly?"

"What-? No."

"Is he an infant?"

"No," Malik growled.

"Then I think we're going to be alright, don't you?" the doctor said with an indulgent smile that made Malik sort of want to break his teeth. "Now, we're not going to _tell _him any of this, because he would just panic like you are currently panicking. Hardly conducive to the recovery process. As far as he is aware, he has a chest infection and a stomach bug. Are we clear?"

"Y-" Malik's voice failed him. He cleared his throat and tried again. "Yes."

"It's up to you whether you tell him the truth after he's recovered," the doctor went on, leaning on his briefcase as he began writing out a prescription. "It might shock him into taking better care of himself."

"...I don't know much about...pneumonia," Malik said after a pause, hating the sound of the very word. "How am I supposed to look after him if I don't know...?"

"It isn't brain surgery," the doctor said blandly, handing him the prescription. "Go to a pharmacist and pick these up. It's just a simple ten-day course of antibiotics, and full instructions about dosage will come with them. You might also want to consider Tylenol or something similar to help with his other symptoms. Other than that, just make sure he gets fluids and plenty of rest."

"...That simple, huh?" Malik said distantly, staring down at the paper in his hands uncomprehendingly. The antibiotic had a long, complicated name that he couldn't even pronounce, never mind attach a meaning to.

"Well, not _quite,_" the doctor acquiesced, not quite looking at him. "I'll give you fair warning: he's going to get worse before he gets better. He's neglected this so long that it's become worse than it ever had to be. And those are strong antibiotics; they're going to hit him hard. If you're determined to be the one taking care of him through this, you're in for a rough week, at the very least."

Malik barely responded to this information – a slight incline of his head was the only indication that he'd even heard.

"So...how will I know if...something's wrong?" he asked quietly, his gaze still fixed on the piece of paper and the scrawl on it that meant nothing to him. "Beyond the normal, I mean."

"Complications are...possible," the doctor said, adjusting his glasses. "Not _likely, _but possible. But should they occur, they will be fairly easy to spot. They'll be...severe. If that happens, my advice is to call for an ambulance."

Malik nodded numbly.

"I'll check back in a week's time to make sure the treatment is progressing as it should be," the doctor said conclusively.

"Thank you," Malik said faintly, with the vague awareness that that was his cue to get out of the car. He did so, and watched with slight resentment as it pulled away, its passenger totally unaffected by the bomb he had just dropped.

* * *

After twenty minutes passed and Malik still hadn't reappeared, Bakura had finally had enough of standing around and ignoring Jounouchi's attempts to draw him into a conversation. Wondering just what the hell could be taking so long, he went to look for him, taking the stairs two at a time.

He hesitated when he reached the bottom of the stairwell and saw Malik standing just inside the bust-up front door, leaning against the wall with his head down. He had a piece of paper in his hands which, Bakura noticed as he approached, were shaking.

"Malik?" he said uncertainly, wary of the blond's volatile mood. "Is the doctor gone...?"

Malik looked up at his voice. He didn't look like the angry, brittle stranger he'd turned into earlier. He looked scared and sad and about a hundred other things Bakura couldn't even give a name to. His violet eyes looked huge and glassy in his pinched, frightened face.

"Bakura," he said faintly. He swallowed hard and his lip trembled. "He..."

"What is it?" Bakura asked nervously. "What'd he say? Does he know what's wrong with Ryou?"

"He...he's really sick," Malik blurted out, covering his face with his hands. His voice sounded odd and muffled from behind them. "It's bad, it's...oh Gods, I hit him, he's really sick and I hit him..."

"What? How bad? Malik, what's _wrong _with him?" Bakura demanded, having to physically refrain from grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him.

Malik dropped his hands. Bakura felt like he'd just been drenched in ice water when he saw that he was crying. _Malik? _Who hadn't cried when Bakura had held a knife to his throat, or on the anniversary of the day his father had carved his back open, or even when Mariku had scared him so badly that he'd been sick with it...?

Bakura would never admit to how scared he felt at that moment. He probably wouldn't even have been able to express how bad it was, anyway, even if he'd wanted to. Malik, who could handle _any_ situation, had been pushed too far and now Malik was crying and Bakura _didn't know what to do_.

It was made worse by the fact that he _wanted _to do something. (Because, fuck it, he liked Malik, he cared about Malik, Malik meant more to him than his still-developing and reluctant human soul could put into words.) But he felt paralysed by his own ignorance – gratuitous bloodshed wouldn't fix this situation. What did people do when someone they cared about was crying? The answer floated half-formed at the edge of his mind but he just couldn't quite grasp it, or maybe he just couldn't bring himself to do it-

He heard loud, thumping footsteps from the stairwell behind him. Turning, he saw Jounouchi thundering down the stairs.

"Hey, what're you guys doing down...here...?" he started to ask before his eyes took in the scene before him. His expression hardened immediately and he turned to Bakura. "What did you do?"

"I didn't do-" Bakura started to protest but Jounouchi wasn't even listening.

"Malik, dude, what happened?" he asked worriedly, elbowing past Bakura and putting a hand on Malik's shoulder. "This asshole do something? Or...?"

Malik just shook his head, sobbing harder. Jounouchi seemed to get the idea. And, without even seeming to think about it, he did what Bakura just hadn't been able to do and grabbed Malik in a tight, fierce hug.

"He's gonna be ok, you hear me?" he said severely. "He's gonna be just fine. Fine."

Bakura watched them silently – helplessly.

"C'mon," Jou said, pulling back and batting Malik lightly over the head. "I guess you're gonna be staying here a while?"

Malik nodded again, rubbing at his eyes with the heel of his hand, trying to get himself back under control. He looked slightly humiliated. Bakura was mildly surprised to realise that he didn't think Malik had anything to be ashamed of.

"Let's go grab some stuff from your place, then," Jounouchi said with an attempt at his trademark goofy grin. "I'll give you a ride."

"It's ok," Malik mumbled. "I can call a cab."

"Shut up, dude. I'm your cab," Jou snorted, waving off his protests. "You got a prescription too? We can pick that up too. Just stay cool, man. Stay cool."

Malik nodded numbly.

"Hey, you," Jounouchi called over his shoulder at Bakura as they went to leave. "You're in charge until we get back, ok? Don't do anything stupid."

Bakura frowned but didn't say anything. He was all out of snappy remarks for the day. And it wasn't even noon yet.

He trudged back up to Ryou's apartment. Once inside, he spent an unspecified amount of time standing outside the living room door before finally summoning the courage (or just the willpower) to go inside.

Ryou was lying in his bed (under the duvet this time), staring blankly at the ceiling. When the door opened he turned his head slowly to see who was coming to disturb him. He eyed Bakura dispassionately, which made him more uncomfortable than any glaring or yelling ever could.

"...You didn't tell me," he muttered, looking away. "You wouldn't tell me why you didn't want me to call him. You didn't say how bad it would be."

"Did I have to?" Ryou replied coldly. "I told you not to call him. The reason was none of your business. And you said you wouldn't. I should have known you were lying."

That stung more than it should have. As if, by calling Malik, Bakura had missed out on an opportunity to garner a tiny amount of trust from his light. Even though he knew that wasn't the case, it still stung.

"What was I supposed to do?" Bakura demanded. To his own ears, he sounded desperate. "I don't know anything. You could have been dying. Does that not matter to you? Do you just not care-?"

"Shut _up!_" Ryou screamed at him suddenly, scrambling into a sitting position. Unlike Malik, he didn't cry. He was just half-mad with anger, frustration, humiliation – was that all? Had he missed anything? He was coughing again and his face was flushed red but he was still screaming, and he grabbed the first thing his hand could find (his alarm clock) and flung it at Bakura. It missed – barely – and hit the wall with a metallic clang. "_Shut up, get out, get __**out-!**_"

Bakura left the room and shut the door behind him. And he stood in the empty hallway and he wondered just how much worse things were going to get.

* * *

_**Oh wow, this took so long D: I'm sorry! Have your overdue dose of ANGST~**_

_**Congrats to the people who guessed it was pneumonia! xD I was impressed. **_

_**Thank you's and snuggles to EgyptianSoul.88, Schizo-of-Destiny, xluluxlunax, bbb136, Bokmal14, killerdoodlebug, earthluva, SkaleFlapper15, A.F. WolfSlinx, Twilight-Imp-626, Seto K4iba1, GoodAndPl3nty, Tender Loving Care, ani, schoolkid, PurpleWildcat2010, A Soul Alone, Hikari-Kira1, melvin the magiciann, xcontagiousx, Chibi Kafka, Holly-Sempai, IceDragon1095, Affy-Bakura, SilversShadow13, ZexionVI 008, ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry bomb, sunokofairytale, bansheegrrl, SHADOWoftheFOX, ACE329, StrawberryAshes, AliceCambio, Neko, BattleGoddess126, Out-Of-Control-Authoress, Fluffy no Danna, safa'at keruth, Airyballoon, Junki, Kathrine, Tiikerikissa, aznprincessali, CalamariCool, VampirePrinssess, Aicutora, Fictatious, nox-immortale, xxfangirlx, Franklyn, Hawaiianbabidoll, Lazy Cat 44, Mana, Enjeru, Golden Mean, crazyhikari, Minerva of The Arctic Mountain, Mi'era Az'ule, Nate-Mihael, bleach15, RenaKounelaki, TheLadyPendragon, Enemy of Righteousness and mystralwind. You guys are so awesome I don't even D:**_

_**I failed at review-replies again last chapter x| I'm sorry, RL kept messing with me. I'll do better this time!**_

_**And SUPER MEGA HUMOUNGOUS thanks to LadyBlackwell for beta'ing/moral support/the chapter title xD ILU.**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x **_


	24. Making Connections

_**Chapter 24: Making Connections**_

When Malik arrived at Ryou's apartment for the second time that day, his appearance did not instil the same feeling of intense relief in Bakura as it had the first time around – since he now knew that, as far as this situation went, Malik was as crazy as Ryou.

Bakura was leaning against the wall next to Ryou's bedroom door when he heard two sets of footsteps climbing the stairwell, and a moment later Malik and Jounouchi stepped into the hallway. Malik had a large duffle bag slung over his shoulder and was carrying a pillow and a duvet (rolled up and held in place by what appeared to be a belt). His eyes were dry now, and he glanced bemusedly in Bakura's direction as he approached.

"Yes, I am aware that I'm outside the room again," Bakura ground out before he could say anything. "Don't look at me. He was yelling and throwing stuff. It would've been bad for his health and mine if I'd stayed."

Malik shook his head wordlessly and walked past him into the bedroom. Bakura scowled after him.

"Hey, give the kid a break," Jounouchi said with an easy smile. "He's had a tough morning."

"_He's _had a tough morning?" Bakura repeated scathingly under his breath.

"What, aren't you used to getting things thrown at you by now?" Jou asked sarcastically.

Bakura glowered at him silently, pressing his lips tightly together to prevent himself from blurting out anything stupid or potentially humiliating. _Idiot, getting an alarm clock thrown at me isn't the problem here! The problem is that he's __**sick **__and I don't know how sick and it's not like I can do anything to help anyway-!_

"Well, I guess it's been a tough day for us all so far," Jounouchi acquiesced at length with a shrug. "Gotta get used to it, though. I figure things won't get much better until Ryou's all done coughing and puking and coughing some more. I hear that taking care of a sick person can be as stressful as being sick yourself. Especially if you're mama-bear-Malik."

"And especially if the sick person is an idiot who doesn't want to be helped," Bakura muttered.

"Yeah, well..." Jounouchi said, looking as though he were trying not to laugh. "Since it was probably you who knocked the sense out of him, I guess it's up to you to knock it back into him?"

"Whatever that means," Bakura mumbled.

"I'm sure you'll figure it out," Jou said with a grin before faltering. "Man, I'm not gonna lie, it's weird just talking to you like this. You're lucky Malik likes you. Otherwise I might have had to do some retribution-ish ass-kicking."

"Just try it," Bakura growled. He wondered if a decent fist-fight might make him feel better in the midst of all this horrible, unfamiliar stress.

"Nah, you're safe for now. Like I said, Malik likes you," Jounouchi reaffirmed. He chortled to himself. "Man, I knew the guy was crazy, but this is taking it to a whole new level..."

"Why the hell do you care what he thinks?" Bakura demanded, narrowing his eyes. "I seem to remember he was on your most-hated list during Battle City. Didn't he screw with your head? Almost get you killed?"

"Aw man, don't go bringing that up," Jounouchi groaned, shaking his head. "I'm no idiot, I haven't forgotten all the shit that went down before."

"Then why are you two so nauseatingly friendly now?" Bakura sneered. "Did you just forget to keep hating him?"

"Hey. Battle-City-Malik was a bastard, ok? He'd tell you that himself. But I'd probably have been a bastard too, if I'd had the life he had. So I figured, 'ok, you had a crappy time, you've done some bad shit – it's all even. Now you get a chance to start over, what are you gonna do with it?' And...well, you know what he's like now. He did good with that second chance. That's what's important, right?" Jounouchi declared, looking mildly triumphant. He clearly thought he'd made his point very succinctly. "And it didn't hurt that he was sorry as hell for everything that happened at that tournament. I got many a free beer out of it."

"You just don't have it in you to hold a grudge, do you?" Bakura said dully, rolling his eyes. He supposed he should have worked that much out when he discovered that the idiot and Kaiba were...done hating each other.

"Guess not," Jou said with a careless shrug. "I don't think it's a bad thing. I mean, the eternal-hateful-grudge thing hasn't done you many favours, has it?"

Bakura frowned and didn't reply. He wasn't sure if the moron meant his never-ending grudge against the Pharaoh (which had been surprisingly far from his mind for most of the time he'd been back in this world) or Ryou's seemingly never-ending grudge against him. Though he supposed the point was valid either way.

"Man, you gotta learn to lighten up," Jounouchi guffawed, shaking his head again and making his way back towards the front door. "But I'll leave you to it. I made the mistake of mentioning Ryou's empty kitchen to Malik, so now I've got a grocery list to go buy." He waved a small piece of paper around indicatively. "Prepare yourself for a rough ten days."

"...Ten days?" Bakura repeated, puzzled, but he was already gone.

* * *

Malik could feel Ryou's eyes following him nervously as he crossed the room and dumped his bag on the floor and the bedding on the sofa.

"...What're you doing?" Ryou ventured timidly at length.

"Marking my territory?" Malik suggested flatly. "Until this is over, your couch is my couch. Get used to it."

"But you have college...!" Ryou started to protest before wilting under the look Malik shot him.

"Yeah, sucks, doesn't it?" Malik said testily, folding his arms. Ryou broke eye-contact first, staring awkwardly down at his knees. The doctor must surely have noticed the stark red mark on his cheek, but he hadn't mentioned it. In fact, at points, when Ryou was being particularly difficult about answering the questions he was asked, the doctor had looked tempted to give him a matching mark on the other side of his face.

"Malik, listen, I'm really sorry about this," Ryou said miserably. "But it's not like before, I _swear _it isn't like that."

Malik laughed weakly.

"Isn't that _worse_?" he questioned with a helpless shrug. "Doesn't the fact that you weren't even trying just make it worse? Like it just comes _naturally _to you now?"

Ryou fell silent again, perhaps realising that there was nothing he could say right now that would get him out of trouble. Malik sighed heavily and walked over to where the alarm clock lay on the floor. He picked it up and examined it. It was of the plastic-cased digital-display variety, and it was clearly never going to work again. It must have been thrown with some considerable force.

"So what did he do this time, to merit an alarm clock attack?" Malik asked acidly, continuing to turn the cracked device over in his hands. "Look at you funny? Step on a creaky floorboard?"

Ryou didn't reply.

"I'm willing to bet he didn't even do anything," Malik muttered, slapping the clock back down on the bedside table despite the fact that it could now function as nothing more than an ugly ornament.

"I _hate _him," Ryou growled softly.

"You try too hard to hate him," Malik snapped. "It's pathetic."

Ryou blinked, taken-aback.

"You're crushing yourself with that hate," Malik informed him in clipped tones. "It's like your security blanket or something. Would it really be so scary for you to acknowledge that he _isn't _that same monster from before now-?"

"You don't know anything about him," Ryou said coldly, eyes narrowed.

"I live with him. I know _plenty_," Malik retorted. "I know more than you because I _listen _and I don't try and force myself to believe that he's completely evil."

"Why are you sticking up for him?" Ryou asked, distress sparking in his eyes. His hands were knotted tightly in the duvet.

"Because someone has to," Malik said shortly. He raked a hand through his hair and sighed exasperatedly. "Besides, I'm sick of trying to make both of you feel like you're in the right. Clearly that approach isn't working. Don't worry, though – I'll be sure to tell him off, too, when he does something stupid. You're both idiots, after all."

Ryou just stared at him, appearing less than pleased with this development.

"...Get some sleep," Malik said tiredly. "According to the doctor, you're going to need it."

"I don't even feel that bad," Ryou muttered irritably, though he did as he was told and laid down. Clearly he had realised by now that there would be consequences if he continued to put up resistance.

"Yeah? That's probably because you've been sick so long that you've forgotten what it's like to feel healthy," Malik said dryly before leaving the room and shutting the door firmly behind him.

* * *

Bakura was loitering in the kitchen, feeling spectacularly useless and more than a little sorry for himself, when Malik emerged from Ryou's bedroom. He made sure to give the blond _plenty _of space as he also entered the kitchen. He wasn't entirely sure whether Malik had regained his sanity quite yet.

"I need some coffee," Malik muttered, switching the kettle on to boil again.

Bakura, who didn't drink coffee, wondered why it seemed to be everyone's answer to everything nowadays.

"What's going to happen for the next ten days?" he asked at length when Malik didn't say anything further.

"Hm?"

"Ten days. Jounouchi said something about everyone being in for ten days of crap."

"Oh," Malik said distantly, pouring water into a mug, into which he'd scooped a more normal amount of instant coffee than Jounouchi had before him. "He meant Ryou's medicine. It's a ten-day course of antibiotics."

"So he'll be better in ten days?" Bakura questioned. He didn't miss the way Malik hesitated.

"Hopefully," Malik replied after an ominous pause. "I mean, he won't be a hundred percent, but his lungs should be clear again, at least..."

"Are you going to tell me what's wrong with him?" Bakura asked, leaning back against the nearby counter.

"...Do you know what pneumonia is?"

"Not really."

"What's the point, then?" Malik said dully.

"It's bad?"

"It's...serious. But the doctor said not to worry. He sure isn't, anyway."

Malik's voice was faintly venomous. Bakura wondered exactly what had been said in that conversation.

"...Sorry I was such a dick to you earlier," Malik said awkwardly, staring into his cup. Bakura blinked in surprise before affixing a more typical, haughty expression.

"You're _apologising_?" he snorted. "Idiot. I don't apologise every time I'm a dick to you, do I? That would take up a lot of our time. Save your breath for more important things."

Fortunately, Malik was smart enough to translate this into 'You wounded me but I understand you were in a state of extreme tension and I appreciate the apology. I forgive you, let's be friends again.' They left it at that.

"...You know you asked about the couch earlier?" Malik said suddenly. "And I bit your head off?"

"It was kind of a stupid question at the time," Bakura muttered with a shrug.

"...It happened not long after Ryou moved here," Malik said quietly. "This place got broken into. Whoever did it just did it out of total badness – it's pretty obvious that someone living here wouldn't have much to steal, right?"

"Pft, yeah."

"I think they took, like, the DVD player or something. But when Ryou got back, the whole place was trashed. Spray paint everywhere, couple of windows smashed. They slashed up the sofa, you saw that. Put their foot through the TV. You name it, they did it. He was so upset. I think..." Malik paused and thought for a moment. "Yeah. That was the last time he called me for help."

"That long ago?" Bakura questioned in surprise. Malik nodded sombrely.

"He phoned me up. He was crying," he went on, his expression far-away and lost in thought. "I think it just sort of added insult to injury. Like, it wasn't bad enough that he'd had to move here – he had to get his shitty apartment torn apart too. We called the police but they never got anyone for it."

"Of course not," Bakura muttered. It was always the same. The authorities didn't care about the people whose lives were already in a mess.

"Ryou was totally freaked, obviously, and the place was a bomb-site, so he spent the night at my place," Malik continued. "It's weird how clearly I remember it all. Just the two of us, on the sofa bed, talking practically the whole night because it's not like he could sleep after that. I remember it was so hard to let him leave again the next day. I knew what he was going back to. It was the hardest thing ever. But I couldn't stop him. And...I guess that's when I started to lose him."

"Why?" Bakura asked uneasily.

"I was a shoulder to cry on after the break-in. And I helped him clean up and everything. But I couldn't actually _help _him," Malik said morosely. "He'd just landed the job at Angels' Lot at that time. He told me about it that night. He was still crying when he told me, he felt so sick with himself. But that guy there...the one with the kid?"

"Aso."

"Yeah. He found out about the break-in. Went and knocked a few heads together. Put the word out that Ryou was off-limits and that anyone who went near him or his apartment was in for a world of pain. And that's the kind of help you need in a place like that."

"...Is Ryou really so shallow?" Bakura asked with a frown. "He fell out of touch with you because you weren't useful to him anymore?"

"Nah. It wasn't like that," Malik said, shaking his head. "He just...doesn't consider me part of that world. His world, now. He wants to keep the two separate. And, of course, he had to...change to adapt to this place. He doesn't like that. And spending too much time with someone who knew the old you is too much of a reminder of how much things have changed."

"Moving here is what made him change so much, huh?"

"In part. It started long before he came here, but...yeah. A lot of it was to do with being here." Malik paused. "I mean, after that break-in, I think that was when he decided to invest in a baseball bat. Kind of sends out a message, huh? Obviously he wasn't planning on calling me up crying next time he had an unwanted guest."

"No kidding," Bakura said dryly, his hand absently wandering to the area of his head that had once been purple with baseball bat-shaped bruises.

"Yeah, too bad for you," Malik said with a faint smile.

"...And what about the other thing I asked you?" Bakura said, catching his gaze and holding it. "He...he was sick before. While I was gone. Even Jounouchi knows that much. But what _was _it? In that dream I had, it...it just felt awful."

Malik looked away. He looked kind of sick himself.

"I don't know what it was," he said lowly, eyes on the floor. "It was just bad. And Yuugi and the others...they were so oblivious. They don't know how bad it got. I think maybe Ryou didn't want them to know. Didn't want to be involved with them anymore. So that left me. _Me. _You have no idea how clueless I was back then, I had no idea what I was doing..."

"Must have been scary," Bakura ventured when he trailed off.

Malik let out a long, shaky breath.

"Yeah," he agreed.

"So how bad _did _it get?" Bakura persisted. "There's more to it than just him getting sick, right? You wouldn't have freaked out so much if it was just that. So...what-?"

"I can't," Malik said shortly, shaking his head roughly. "I...can't talk about that. I'm sorry. We locked it up, me and him. It's between the two of us, and we said we'd never talk about it. He'd kill me if I told you, anyway."

"I guess that means it got _very bad_," Bakura said, doing his utmost to keep his rising irritation at bay. "And it doesn't look so good this time, either."

"...Are you worried?" Malik asked, not looking at him.

Bakura frowned.

"...Yeah," he muttered after a moment of thought. "I guess I am."

Malik managed a smile at that.

"At least someone's crawling out of denial," he said, some warmth returning to his expression. "And just so you know, you did the right thing. You probably don't think so, what with Ryou throwing things at you and me just generally freaking out, but you did. I'll make sure he's ok."

"You better," Bakura said with an attempt at a smirk. "He'd be fucked if I was left in charge."

Malik laughed softly.

"You should probably go home," he said. He jerked his head in the direction of Ryou's bedroom. "He's mortified by this whole situation, which means he's even more on-edge than usual. In other words, he'll only throw more things at you and verbally abuse you if you hang around and try to help."

"What else is new?" Bakura said, rolling his eyes.

"As for me..." Malik said, taking a glass out of a nearby cupboard and filling it with cold water from the tap. "It's time for me to go force the first of many pills down his unwilling throat."

"Good luck with that," Bakura told him with faint amusement. "...It's too bad that this place is such an...unhealthy environment, though. You can only do so much."

"Yeah, it's not exactly cosy in here, is it?" Malik said with a grimace. "I guess heating bills must be a problem for him. I'd prefer to hold him captive at my apartment for the next week or so, but he'd go crazy if I suggested it. And I think I'm going to be forcing him to do enough things he doesn't want to do over the next little while."

"What, like take his medicine and eat a decent meal or two?" Bakura questioned.

"Yeah, stuff like that," Malik said with a small smile.

"Well, I'm going to clear out before your moron friend gets back with your food order," Bakura announced. "I'm sure Ryou will drive you crazy here, but try not to hit him _too _often, ok? His body doesn't have time to be healing bruises and stuff, it needs to concentrate on the...pneumonia? Is that what it is?"

"Yeah," Malik confirmed. His expression had immediately become strained at the mention of the word. "He doesn't know that, though. That's important. We're not telling him that."

"...Alright," Bakura agreed with a shrug. "I'll see you later."

"Hey, Bakura," Malik called after him as he made to leave. He wore a slightly impish, but still genuine, smile. "I meant to say, it's nice that you can use his name now, isn't it?"

"Don't start _that _again," Bakura muttered, shaking his head and exiting the shoddy apartment. Only once he had securely closed the door behind him did he let his neutral expression fade away and be replaced by a brow-furrowing frown that betrayed his true anxiety. His lack of knowledge about modern diseases and medicine was frustrating, but it didn't prevent him from having an awareness that, whatever was wrong with Ryou, it was _pretty bad. _Bad enough to make Malik cry. Bad enough that they weren't even allowed to tell him about it.

Bakura clenched his fists tightly and started to make his way down the damp-smelling staircase, feeling as though his mind was engaged in a fierce battle with his feet the whole way. Every step was an effort. Even though he knew that there was nothing he could do to help, and that his presence really would only make the situation worse, it was hard to just walk away.

"You're so _difficult_," he mumbled, pausing to glance over his shoulder, back towards the door behind which Malik was undoubtedly now watching to make sure Ryou took the medicine given to him.

Bakura wondered if Ryou was going to die.

He was surprised by the strong feeling that exploded in his chest at that thought. Like strong hands wrapping around his heart and squeezing tight.

_I don't want you to die, _he realised dazedly. _I really, really don't. You can't die when things are still like this. You've got to give me a chance to fix it. _

He remembered the way he had scoffed at all the people who had asked him if he wanted to 'fix things' not that long ago. Funny how it seemed like the only option now. All of a sudden, he couldn't think of anything else he should be doing.

He wondered if that was what it meant to be human. Always trying to fix the fuck-ups you'd made in the past.

Demons had it easy, it seemed.

He reached the ground floor and its broken front door, despite the dull ache in his chest and the strange, itching desire to go back and appeal to Ryou one last time. _Just this once, could you stop being a brat and let me help you? There's nothing worse than feeling useless __**and **__helpless, I thought you would know that..._

Pft. Like that would work.

Finally, he stepped out into the cold. (Though, now that it was February, the early-spring air was _just _starting to lose its icy sting.) He forced himself not to look back as he started to make his way along the sidewalk with no clear destination in mind. He knew he couldn't just go back to Malik's apartment to vegetate all day. He'd _completely _lose it if he didn't at least keep himself occupied.

He didn't look back as he walked away, but, since this _was _South Domino, he kept a sharp eye out to his left and right, just in case. And as he looked around the corner of Ryou's building, he didn't like what he saw.

"...Thief," Mariku said plainly when their eyes met.

"You," Bakura snarled, his lip curling. "Just when I thought this day couldn't get any damn worse."

"Why is omote here?" Mariku asked with a frown, ignoring this acerbic greeting. "This is where your light lives. Not omote."

"I know that," Bakura spat. "Malik can be here if he wants. It's you who shouldn't be here."

"Hmm? Omote can't see me out here, can he?" Mariku said vaguely. "So it's ok, isn't it? He doesn't know I'm here."

"What, are you planning on sneaking up on him again?"

"No. Doesn't help. I'll stay hidden," Mariku said glumly. "And that won't help either. But I guess it won't hurt. It's funny, isn't it? How you want to be near someone when something's wrong? Is that how all people feel...?"

Bakura eyed him suspiciously.

"Is something wrong with your light?" Mariku asked curiously. "Are you scared to walk away from here too?"

"How do you know anything's wrong at all?" Bakura snapped.

"...Because omote is hurting," Mariku said simply. "It's really bad."

Bakura stared at him silently.

"And I guess I'm hurting too," Mariku said with a faint smile. "It hurts when you can't help them, doesn't it? But I'm sure you know that."

"You really think I'll buy that shit like Ryou did?" Bakura growled darkly. "Why would you want to help _anyone?_ Especially Malik. All you ever wanted to do was get rid of him-"

"Then why are you here, Thief?" Mariku asked. "I remember you from before too, you know. You never cared about your light. You wanted the body, but not the mind that came with it. If he had disappeared, you wouldn't have been sad. So if we really can't ever change, what are you doing here now?"

Bakura was a little thrown by this, but did his best not to show it and simply continued glaring at him.

"If he disappeared now, you would be sad, hm?" Mariku questioned, tilting his head over to one side. "So something must have changed. So we can change."

"I've told you before, I'm _not like you_," Bakura hissed, eyes narrowed dangerously.

"...But your light hates you, doesn't he?" Mariku went on. The tone of his voice didn't change – there was no suggestion that he intended to sound mocking or cruel. He was simply stating a fact. "He doesn't see past the hate. That must hurt a lot, when he doesn't believe you. When he just says 'You don't care, you just want to hurt me, because you always hurt me'. It must be hard."

Much to his own annoyance, Bakura's scowl slowly morphed into a blank stare as he tried to process this. Sure, it was hard. It was _infuriating, _too. When the one person you wanted to help (_more than anything, _whispered an irritating voice in his mind that he swiftly pushed aside) refused to believe that you wanted to do anything but harm to them, it felt like...like walking in a mine-field. To do nothing wouldn't solve anything, but any move he made, any step he made in any direction, was more than likely to blow up in his face. It was one of the worst feelings he'd ever encountered. Especially since, for the first time in long time, he wanted to do something _right_, but it seemed like there was no right thing to do.

"But at least you can see him," Mariku piped up suddenly, jerking Bakura out of his gloomy thoughts. "At least you can try, over and over again, to make him see. Even if nothing works, at least you'll feel like you tried."

"What are you saying...?" Bakura said suspiciously.

"...It must be nice. To be able to try," Mariku elaborated with that same pallid smile that suddenly looked horribly sad.

The pieces slowly came together in Bakura's mind. He was sure Malik would have understood a lot faster – but, of course, Malik would never have this conversation with his darkness. Because Malik was afraid of him – so afraid that he found it hard just to say his name. Malik, like Ryou, could not even entertain the idea that his darker half could want to do anything other than hurt him.

Bakura couldn't help but fidget slightly when he realised that he had inadvertently followed Ryou and Malik's lead and done the exact same thing by deciding, without even thinking, that Mariku was nothing but the deranged psychopath he had been before. Despite the fact that he, a self-proclaimed monster, had found it in him to change (he acknowledged it now, however grudgingly), it just hadn't crossed his mind that his fellow monster might have gone through a similar process while chained up in the shadows.

_"Time goes slowly in the darkness. There isn't much to do except think...and think...and maybe change..."_

Bakura supposed it was a _little _hypocritical of him. If he hated the way Ryou turned a blind eye to his every effort to repent, it seemed unfair of him to do the same to someone else. Even if it was the guy who'd sent him to the shadows in a blazing ball of flame.

"You..." Bakura started uncertainly. "You don't want to hurt Malik? Is that it?"

Mariku's smile widened and lost some of its melancholy edge.

"That's it, thief," he replied.

"Then...what? What do you want?" Bakura asked, deciding he would consider the credibility of this statement later. Mariku blinked.

"Same as you, I think," he said with a shrug. "Can you imagine being apart from your light now? Having your own life that's nothing to do with him? It's not a good thought, is it?"

"...No," Bakura muttered, looking away. Even if all they ever did was fight and hurt each other, life without Ryou seemed an absurd concept. Did it really feel the same for Mariku? Even though he was just lurking on the edges of Malik's life, unseen and unwanted-?

Bakura rubbed at the back of his neck uncomfortably as the full implications of what Mariku had been saying crashed down on him. His and Ryou's non-relationship might _suck, _but...yeah, at least he _could _be near him. They clashed at every opportunity but that in itself was contact, right? Communication, like Malik said. Even if they were making no progress, at least Bakura never had to feel like he wasn't trying. Whereas Mariku had nothing. His mine-field was even more lethal than Bakura's own – he literally couldn't make one move. If Malik even saw him out of the corner of his eye, he would run. Mariku couldn't even try to make up for what he'd done. If repentance was what he really wanted, then that was an even worse punishment than what Bakura had been dealt.

Bakura glanced up but Mariku wasn't looking at him. He was gazing up the nearby apartment block with a vacant expression – perhaps wondering what Malik was doing right now. Or perhaps trying to decide on the best way to kill them all. It really was impossible to tell.

"...Hey," Bakura said gruffly. "Why _did _you go to the game shop that day?"

Mariku blinked again and turned to face him, as if only just remembering that he was there.

"Because omote was a scary kind of sad," he replied plainly. "It felt like it was going to swallow him up. I was stupid to go, because of course I couldn't help. But at that time, doing nothing like always just...wasn't enough. It's hard, you know."

"How did you know he was sad?" Bakura asked slowly, though a part of him already knew. Mariku sent a crooked grin his way.

"Think, thief. I'm sure there are things you know about your light that no one else could know," he said. "How?"

"The connections," Bakura muttered, folding his arms. "So that's a 'heart connection', huh?"

Mariku didn't respond – he'd gone back to looking up at the building. Bakura eyed him uneasily, wondering if this really was all just an elaborate act to lull him (and Ryou, he supposed) into some false sense of security. But was it really fair to think like that, when all he wanted was for Ryou to _stop _thinking like that...?

He supposed Mariku had no...motive for hurting Malik now. After all, it was fairly obvious that he, like Bakura and the Pharaoh, had been granted a body of his own, by who or whatever for whatever reason. And that was what he'd always wanted, right? Besides the urge to maim and kill, the only other thing Mariku had ever seemed to yearn was to _exist-_

Bakura almost jumped as he was hit by a bolt-of-lightning epiphany: right now, Mariku, like him, was learning to be human.

"...Alright," he said sullenly.

"...What?" Mariku questioned, gracing him with eye contact again.

"I'll buy...this," Bakura said gruffly, gesturing in Mariku's general direction. "I'll buy that three-and-a-bit years in the shadows somehow sucked the murderous rage out of you. I'll buy that you don't have some prerogative to hurt or kill Malik. Or Ryou. Or even me."

"...That's nice of you," Mariku remarked, looking faintly amused – as if wondering what had taken Bakura so long to reach this conclusion.

"You can't hang around here, though. If I have to walk away from all of this, then so do you," Bakura informed him as he turned to walk away. "Come on."

Mariku frowned unhappily but obeyed, falling roughly into step with him. Maybe he figured that hiding out here alone might actually be the more soul-destroying option. To those who knew, the sight of the two of them walking along quite amicably together would probably have been one of the most terrifying spectacles in the world. Bakura was half-expecting the Pharaoh to come running at them with a duel-disk any damn second.

"...So what _is _wrong in there?" Mariku asked at length. Bakura felt a mild prickle of embarrassment as he realised he'd never bothered actually telling him.

"Ryou's sick," he said for what felt like the hundredth time. "It's pretty bad, I think."

"Oh. It's ok. Omote is taking care of him, right?" Mariku said brightly. It occurred to Bakura that he seemed to be under the impression that there was nothing Malik couldn't do. "Don't worry."

"I'm not worried," Bakura lied snappishly. "Ryou's going to be fine."

Mariku sniggered quietly.

"You sure use his name a lot more than he uses yours," he commented.

"Don't you start with that too," Bakura groaned, rolling his eyes.

* * *

Bakura wasn't all that surprised when his feet carried him, almost automatically, to the staff door of Angels' Lot. Well, why not? Where else was he going to go? His universe basically consisted of Malik's apartment, Ryou's apartment and this place, and the former two weren't options at the moment.

"Touzoku," Kazuma (who never seemed to go home) said with a blink when he noticed him. "What you doin' here, huh? Just can't stay away?" Around this point his usual goofy grin came out to play. "Are you trying to steal Ryou's job while he's down for the count?"

"Hardly," Bakura snorted. This place would turn into a bloodbath if he had to do Ryou's job for even one night. "But I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark and say that this place doesn't bother with sick pay?"

"...Of course not. The boss man's stingy enough about giving out regular pay," Kazuma said, rolling his eyes.

"Guess you better find something for me to do, then," Bakura said conclusively, going to put his coat away.

"Say what?" Kazuma questioned in amusement.

"Look, I'm going to get the blame for him being incarcerated in his apartment for the next week or so," Bakura said impatiently. "I'm _not _taking the blame for him missing a rent payment or something stupid like that, too."

"That's very cute, Touzoku," Kazuma said with a toothy smile.

"Is it? I call it self-preservation," Bakura said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

"Sure," Kazuma said, rolling his eyes. "But should you really leave him alone when he's sick? I wouldn't trust that kid to stay in bed. I'm surprised you even managed to convince him to stay home."

"Idiot. It wasn't _me _who 'convinced' him. If I told him to stay home, he'd do the opposite out of pure spite," Bakura pointed out dryly. "I called a friend of his. He's keeping him under lock and key. And taking care of him, I guess."

"Aw, man," Kazuma said, clapping Bakura's shoulder with one hand and wiping away an imaginary tear with the other. "I'm so proud. You saved his health and now you're saving his bank account. You're on your way to becoming such a fine young man."

"Shut up," Bakura grumbled, swiping his hand away and ignoring the ensuing laughter.

"...Say, who's your friend?" Kazuma asked suddenly, finally noticing Mariku who was still standing in the open doorway, gazing at a crow pecking at a nearby garbage bag.

"I wouldn't say he's a friend, exactly. I'm babysitting him, I think," Bakura muttered. "Hey! You want to get in here? You're letting a draught in."

Mariku blinked benignly at him and obeyed, though his eyes were still fixed raptly on the bird right up until the moment he shut the door.

"So what's the deal with you two?" Kazuma asked uncertainly, his eyes flicking back and forth between them.

"...Basically, he is to Ryou's friend as I am to Ryou," Bakura said with a shrug.

"Woah, really? I thought you guys were pretty unique," Kazuma chuckled before tipping his head in Mariku's direction. "Tough break, man."

Mariku looked as though he wasn't sure what to say, and in the end he just said nothing.

"Wow, another friendly one, huh? Did you rub off on him, Touzoku?" Kazuma asked in amusement, clearly trying to keep the mood light.

"I doubt that," was the sour reply. Maybe if Kazuma had had any idea of what Bakura's morning had been like thus far, he would have toned the banter down at least a little.

"Well, you're in luck, delivery just came in," Kazuma announced, clapping his hands together. "How'd you feel about lugging crates, Touzoku?"

"Am I supposed to feel intimidated by the prospect?" Bakura asked dully, signalling for him to lead the way.

The heavy, manual work helped, sort of. It didn't require thinking. It was a simple, if strenuous, task and it allowed Bakura to focus almost exclusively on what he was doing, which in turn allowed him to push Ryou's sickness and Malik's secrets and Mariku's possible ulterior motives to the back of his mind. Unfortunately, those things remained there like a persistent headache, festering and mouldering on the edge of his thoughts.

When afternoon rolled around, Kazuma briefly left to collect Mio from pre-school. She was, naturally, devastated to learn that Ryou was ill (and not coming to the club to entertain her later) and demanded that she be allowed to visit him. Kazuma shot Bakura a questioning look, at which point he was forced to admit that he had no idea whether Ryou could currently be considered contagious or not. Mio had to content herself with a promise from her father that she could make Ryou a 'get well soon' card, and that was _sure _to make him feel better.

"Man," Kazuma remarked to Bakura as they finished hauling the last of the crates into the store-room. "Your friend might not talk much, but it looks like he's sure got a way with kids."

Frowning, Bakura looked over his shoulder into the main kitchen area and saw Mio was now sitting on the tiled floor with the book she'd brought from pre-school in her lap. (Bakura had seen her with it before – it seemed to be about a cartoon tadpole on his journey to becoming a full-grown frog. She was openly fascinated by the concept.) Even though the book was mainly just cutely-rendered pictures with small amounts of blocky, easy-to-read text, she was turning the pages and pointing to things and appeared to be talking very knowledgeably about the tadpole-to-frog transformation. And Mariku was peering over her shoulder, his eyes following her small finger as it jabbed importantly at the sections relevant to what she was apparently saying. Bakura felt his insides tighten with unease on instinct alone. Sure, he'd said he'd believe that Mariku wasn't out to kill anyone. But that didn't mean he believed it implicitly. Not _yet. _This could be considered something of a probationary period. So the sight of him in such close proximity to a young child was still...disturbing.

After all, Mariku could probably crush Mio's tiny skull with one hand.

Ryou wouldn't like that.

...Bakura wouldn't like that, either.

"Here's your prize, Touzoku," Kazuma said suddenly, grabbing two bottles of beer from the nearest crate and throwing one to him. "I won't even take it out your wages or anything. I'm a generous boss, huh?"

"You aren't _anyone's _boss," Bakura snorted. It seemed Kazuma was too thirsty to bother with a witty retort, since he settled for cracking his bottle open and gulping down its contents more quickly than could really be considered healthy.

Bakura was thirsty too, but also rather wary of the effects of alcohol on the human brain after his experiences in this place and on the immortalised 'drunk Malik night'. He figured one bottle was unlikely to kill him, though, and so positioned himself at the counter closest to Mariku and Mio (you couldn't be too careful, right?) and drank it slowly. It didn't taste _exactly _like he remembered Egyptian beer tasting, but it was familiar enough to almost be comforting.

"My teacher says the frogs will all be making their eggs soon," Mio was chirping. "She says we'll be able to see real tadpoles in the pond at the park."

"...The pond," Mariku repeated, blinking thoughtfully and then giving a small crooked smile. "I know that place. It has ducks too."

"Yeah, yeah!" Mio agreed enthusiastically, nodding. "I like going to feed the ducks. They like bread. And...and people should feed them a lot just now, because it's cold and they might not be able to find other food in the pond."

"Is that it?" Mariku said in surprise. "They always get so excited when people throw bread in. I thought they were just greedy. Maybe they're hungry."

"Definitely hungry," Mio said decisively.

Bakura found himself fighting down a snort of laughter. (He also found himself suddenly feeling a lot less concerned for Mio's wellbeing.) He himself struggled to communicate with Mio. Ryou was better at it. Ryou had a natural knack for talking to her on her own level. But it was an _adjustment, _of course. It seemed that Mariku didn't even have to try. And Mio was clearly lapping it up – Bakura could see how puffed up with pride she was over getting to be the teacher for once.

He shook his head. The world was going crazy. Maybe he should drink more beer.

Bakura wasn't sure what time he eventually left the Lot. He wasn't sure he even wanted to know. _Late, _he allowed himself to acknowledge. It was pretty late.

Since Ryou wasn't there, Kazuma just put him on general bouncer duty for the night. Bakura was oddly disappointed that none of the customers tried anything that merited a fist in the mouth. Beating someone deserving of it would have been great for releasing tension. But as it happened, the only thing of note that happened the whole evening was that Ryou's bumbling admirer (_Hideki, _Bakura reminded himself) put in an appearance. Kazuma took pity on him and went and told him that Ryou was ill and unlikely to be at work for a while. Bakura, watching the exchange from a distance, saw the young man nod (looking rather intimidated by Kazuma towering over him the whole while) and leave.

"Man. He didn't even pester me for Ryou's address so that he could rush to his side!" Kazuma complained, coming to stand next to Bakura with his arms folded. "What kind of man is that? I'm telling you, Touzoku, you've got to get in there first. Ryou deserves someone with more dedication and-"

"Shut up," Bakura muttered, walking away. _Ryou hates me, please stop rubbing it in. Thank you._

Mariku came and went in the course of the evening, eventually disappearing entirely. He didn't drop any hints as to where he might be going, but Bakura suspected he'd gone back to Ryou's apartment building. He supposed he could understand why he would. Cold comfort was better than no comfort at all. Or something.

He himself only dragged himself back to Malik's apartment when he was _sure _that he was exhausted enough to sleep. And he was successful enough in that department – almost as soon as he succeeded in setting up the sofa bed (a process he could now complete with his eyes closed), he collapsed onto it and fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep.

However, if he'd known how little sleep he would get over the next ten days or so (especially of the dreamless variety), he might have appreciated it more.

* * *

_**Is it bad that I was proud of myself for finishing this chapter? xD I was thinking 'wow, that was pretty quick!' But then I looked at my last update and was like 'oh, it's actually been like a month. Never mind.' /pride dies/**_

_**But but but! Look, look, over 1000 reviews! :o That's so crazy! Thank you so much to everyone who's ever reviewed ever D':**_

_**Over 1000 thank you's to Lachen, Callette, BattleGoddess126, Junki, Twilight-Imp-626, schoolkid, Schizo-of-Destiny, Bokmal14, Tiikerikissa, Mi'era Az'ule, IceDragon1095, Hotaru Layla, A Soul Alone, HeartShapedLocket, Shamrokk, Hikari-Kira1, SoraSlayer, EgyptianSoul.88, Nate-Mihael, nox-immortale, PurpleWildcat2010, ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry bomb, bbb136, subaru1999, GoodAndPl3nty, RedundantRedundancy, Explosive Sugar Berry, TexasDreamer01, MissPessimist, VampirePrinssess, Anubis46545, xxfangirlx, killerdoodlebug, Seto K4iba1, bansheegrrl, Tender Loving Care, CalamariCool, TheLadyPendragon, crazyhikari, Xaikra, Gee, BlueSpiritFire1, Stray Neko, aigoo, Fictatious, Enjeru, sakuraXdrops, Phantom Hunter of the Soul, StrawberryAshes, MetalMark, Mana, Holly-Sempai, xXMekkzyFwuffzXx, Sin Piedad, Calm Envy, , RiverTears980, Hellion16, Sakura the Strange, safa'at keruth, looptheloopy, Affy-Bakura, Franklyn, sefina, guardianxofxmoon, kal277, Rekhyte, Superkitty140 and Aqua girl 007. Your reviews are like my calorie-free alternative to chocolate :)**_

_**And thank you to LadyBlackwell as always for beta'ing :3**_

_**Ok, I PROMISE some stuff actually kicks off next chapter xD I slogged through this one like 'JUST A BIT MORE FILLER. I CAN DO THIS.' S-so hopefully...?**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x **_


	25. Sleep

_**Chapter 25: Sleep**_

"Ryou? Ryou. Come on, wake up. You've got to eat."

Malik shook Ryou's shoulder gently and then sighed when he didn't even stir. The doctor certainly hadn't been exaggerating when he'd said that the strong antibiotics would hit Ryou hard. The pills themselves were alarmingly large, like some kind of medicine you'd expect to give to a horse or rhinoceros, and the first dose had knocked Ryou out for so long that it had seemed like he wouldn't wake up in time for the second lot.

Malik hadn't liked that.

He'd started to regret sending Bakura away, because being alone in a silent apartment, trying to no avail to wake his friend, had filled him with the most sickening sense of history repeating itself.

Maybe he'd panicked a little. Stared raptly at the phone, desperately wanting to call the doctor, an ambulance, Bakura, _anyone, _but always stopping himself at the last minute. Thinking, _wait five more minutes, he might wake up, wait just a little longer. _

He didn't really remember it too clearly now. Anxiety like that made his brain shut down.

In any case, they were now on Day Three, and Malik was now calm (sort of) and certain (in a shaky kind of way) that Ryou would always wake up eventually from his drug- and general-exhaustion-induced stupor.

Still, that didn't stop him from tugging the duvet aside and pinching the skin of Ryou's arm more roughly than was strictly necessary. It was a successful enough tactic, he found; Ryou jumped awake with a startled squeak of pain.

"...Why?" he mumbled pathetically, drawing the word out into a whine. His voice was hoarse to the point where it was almost funny. Almost.

"It's time to eat," Malik replied. "No point in taking your medicine if you're not going to start eating properly. Look at you, you're so...bony."

"Whatever," Ryou groaned, reluctantly hauling himself into a sitting position. "Even if I take my medicine and eat properly, I'm still going to have bruises up and down my arm if you don't stop doing that."

"Should I dunk cold water over you next time?" Malik asked. Despite himself, he could feel a small smile tugging at his mouth. "You're really difficult to wake up gently, you know. I guess your body's trying to catch up on all the sleep it's been missing for...I dunno, two years?"

Ryou muttered something croaky and unintelligible, scratching absently at the skin of his throat with one hand.

"Cut that out," Malik said, batting the hand away. This seemed to be a new habit of Ryou's, and he'd been doing it almost non-stop. "Do you want to claw your own throat out?"

"It hurts," Ryou complained. "And it _itches."_

"Yeah, on the _inside. _You've got a packet of throat soothers right there, I'd say those would be more effective."

Ryou grumbled some more but stopped scratching. He'd exhausted himself yesterday and the day before with his protests about how Malik didn't have to look after him and cook for him and pinch him awake every so often, but he'd been steadfastly ignored and had now fallen into a kind of sullen, humiliated acceptance of his fate. He'd eat the food he was given, he'd take whatever medicine was thrown at him and, most crucially, he'd do as he was told. He probably didn't want to get slapped again. In a way, Malik was glad that the dynamic of their friendship had changed so much from what it had been before. He got the worst feeling that they wouldn't even be in this situation if he'd been firmer with Ryou last time.

"You get soup today," Malik said, picking up the tray he'd left on the chest of drawers and plopping it in Ryou's lap. "Don't ask me what kind because I don't know. If it tastes bad, I'm sorry."

"Thanks," Ryou mumbled, picking up the spoon and not looking at him once. Malik was privately amused that even Bakura was less awkward about accepting a meal these days.

Speaking of which, he hoped Bakura hadn't burned his apartment building down or poisoned himself in his absence. Was cooking a mandatory skill for a King of Thieves? Maybe he should throw a few meals together for Bakura to put in the ice-box back home. Reheating food couldn't be too much of a challenge.

Lunch was partaken mostly in silence. Ryou didn't seem terrified to open his mouth and speak like he had after all the fireworks yesterday; he just seemed genuinely too exhausted to make much conversation. Malik knew he was feeling resentful – he'd already complained more than once that he'd never felt _this _sick until he'd been officially declared sick. And Malik could only repeat the doctor's words in his own defence: _worse before you get better, worse before you get better. It'll be worth it, I swear. What would you prefer, feeling like this for a little while or feeling only half-alive until your body finally gives out and-?_

No.

Malik finished his own food and marched briskly to the kitchen to rinse his bowl out, shaking his head sharply to banish any residual morbid thoughts. When he came back, Ryou was still working his way through his small bowl of soup, sluggishly and without enthusiasm. Every so often he'd glance up at the living room doorway, or tilt his head slightly as if listening for some sound.

"He's not here," Malik informed him. Ryou jumped before frowning.

"I wasn't..." he started.

"You were," Malik corrected him mildly. "But he's not here. I sent him away. Figured you'd only end up hurting yourself if he stuck around. And him, if you got your way."

Ryou snorted derisively and didn't say anything more.

"...I'm not going to stop giving you a hard time about him, you know," Malik said. "It's going to become part of the routine now. Every time you wake up, you're going to eat something, and I'm going to talk to you about Bakura."

"Maybe I won't wake up, then," Ryou snapped unthinkingly. He instantly paled at the look Malik shot him. "I...didn't mean that. I just...why?"

"Why?" Malik repeated. "Where do you want me to start? Because that hate is like a poison in you. It's ruining you. Because you've hurt each other enough. Because, in the end, it's so pointless."

"So you think he and I are even now?" Ryou asked quietly. It was Malik's turn to snort.

"Is that really what it's all about? Getting even?" he said. Ryou looked away, shamefaced. "No, I didn't think so. It's about...blame? Blame and frustration and making yourself feel better."

"Are you planning on specialising in counselling psychology?" Ryou asked sourly. "Because, to be honest, you aren't great in the tact department."

"I believe in honesty between friends," Malik replied. He'd been prepared for Ryou to make every effort to change the subject at this early stage. But he'd persevere, just like he'd warned. Every time Ryou woke up, there was going to be a lecture waiting for him. One way or another, Malik was going to get through to him.

"Being _honest _doesn't make you _right_," Ryou muttered.

"Really?" Malik said, settling himself comfortably on the sofa since it seemed this debate could go on a while. "So you think you do have something to gain from attacking Bakura at the slightest provocation?"

"It's not _about _gaining anything," Ryou said, and Malik could hear the old anger in his voice, could tell that he'd gritted his teeth and clenched his jaw. "It doesn't matter if there's no point. It's...about..."

"You don't want to stop hating him," Malik finished for him. "You don't want anything to change."

Ryou was sick and Ryou was very, very tired, but his eyes flashed with fury at that.

"Don't you say that as if you're so disgusted by it," he said, raising his voice as much as he was able to. "You're no better. Where's Mariku? You don't even know. You haven't spoken to him, gone looking for him, tried to forgive him-"

"That's different," Malik started to protest, feeling his chest tighten.

"How is it different?" Ryou howled. "Because you're scared instead of angry? It's not different at all. You don't want to forgive him, you don't want to be near him, and so you do _nothing. _So don't sit there and feel superior because _you've _made some kind of peace with Bakura, when he never hurt you or...I mean, worry about fixing _yourself _before you start-!"

He broke off, coughing harshly. Malik got to his feet and placed two pills on the edge of the bed.

"Take your medicine," he said flatly before leaving the room.

* * *

Bakura had concluded that Domino City was just about the dreariest and most boring place in the modern world.

He'd woken early that morning and, instead of enjoying the peace and quiet and the knowledge that he wouldn't be getting abused by Ryou at the Lot later, had felt too restless and fidgety to even stay within the confines of Malik's warm apartment. And so he'd thrown on his coat and gone for a walk. Or perhaps a wander would be more accurate. He was wandering down endless streets that all looked the same, and it wasn't helping.

Maybe this place didn't seem so bad when you were _part _of it, he mused resentfully as he sank onto a bench and absently watched the passersby. It was probably as good a place as any when you were a college student going along chattering to your friends, or an office worker eating lunch with your colleagues, or a young mother pushing a stroller and being harassed by your toddler for candy. But when you were pretty much alone in this city, with no roots or connection to it and no _real _reason to be there, it was...dismal.

"Why are you always making that face?" asked a familiar voice. "Does your stomach hurt?"

Bakura felt he did _very _well not to jump when Mariku suddenly sat down beside him, as if they had prearranged this meeting and he hadn't just appeared out of nowhere.

"What?" he said.

"You always look like you have a stomach-ache," Mariku reiterated.

"...What are you doing here?" Bakura asked, opting not to comment on this observation. Mariku blinked and looked at him as if this was just about the dumbest question he'd ever heard.

"I wanted to talk to you," he replied warily. "That's allowed now, right?"

"How did you _find _me?" Bakura demanded, feeling a headache starting to pulse in his temples already. "Did the Shadow Realm give you super-powers too?"

"No," Mariku said, looking surprised. The seriousness of his expression made Bakura want to groan and thump his head against a wall. "I was outside Ryou's building and I saw you. You went past three times."

"...I did?" Bakura said, startled out of his annoyance. He really _hadn't _been paying attention to where his feet took him, and it was more than a little embarrassing that he had gone to that particular place on autopilot. Three times, no less. He frowned and glanced around him and confirmed that he currently wasn't even in South Domino. "How long have you been following me?"

"I wanted to wait until you stopped."

"Then..." Bakura paused, decided it wasn't worth it, gave up and moved on. "What do you want?"

Mariku shifted unhappily in his seat.

"Something's wrong with omote," he said.

"Must you call him that?" Bakura said, injecting his voice with more annoyance than he really felt. "And don't tell me he's sick too now."

"Not _sick. _But not happy, either."

"Well," Bakura said with a shrug, "he's worried about Ryou."

"But it's not just 'worried'," Mariku persisted. "I _know _'worried' now. It's something else. A whole lot of things. He keeps getting sad and angry and scared and then _really _angry and _really _scared."

"Oh." Bakura nodded in understanding. "Yeah. That's probably because..." He tried to think of a tactful way to word it. "Ryou isn't the easiest person to take care of these days."

"But he and omote are friends, right?"

"Yeah."

"And friends are good."

"So they say."

"Then why...?"

"Look, it's complicated," Bakura interrupted. He snorted humourlessly. "That's pretty much the first thing you have to know about being human. Everything is complicated."

Mariku pondered this for a few moments.

"You and omote are friends too?" he said finally.

"His name is _Malik_," Bakura hissed in response. "And...I don't know. I never thought about it."

"So think about it."

"What's it to you, anyway?" Bakura snapped.

"You make him angry sometimes, too," Mariku informed him with a small smile. "But other times, you make him happy. Same with Ryou. So is that what being friends means?"

"Like I just told you, it's _complicated_," Bakura said gruffly, looking away. "...I really make him _happy?_"

"Sometimes. Mostly he just wants to hit you."

Bakura chuckled quietly. "Good to know I haven't completely lost my touch."

"Will you go see him?" Mariku asked suddenly. "It feels like he's going crazy up there. Just this morning – scared, angry, scared-"

"He told me to stay away," Bakura informed him. "Ryou needs to chill the fuck out and get some _rest _if he's going to get better, and that's never going to happen while I'm around."

"...Are you scared?" Mariku asked. There was a faintly sly twinkle in his eye, suggesting that perhaps he hadn't lost _all _of his powers of manipulation.

"Let's not play that game," Bakura said with a scowl. Mariku shrugged.

"If Ryou's so difficult to take care of, like you said," he said, "then omote might need some help."

Bakura couldn't help but roll his eyes.

"What the hell did the Shadows do to your head?" he asked.

"My head?"

"You were a murderous psychopath," Bakura reminded him. "Now you just want Malik to be ok? What happened?"

"...It wasn't the Shadows," Mariku told him with a small shrug. "I thought about a lot of things there. But I couldn't understand those things, because I only knew 'hate' and 'rage'. That's all I was. But..." he paused, tilting his head back to look at the sky. "Whatever brought us back to this world made us whole. We're not just spirits or monsters anymore. We have our own bodies. Our own souls."

Bakura stared at him mutely.

"Coming back felt very...big," Mariku laughed. "Everything felt different. Looked different. Just _was _different. I thought I'd explode."

"So before, you really _were _just...a part of Malik that had gone bad," Bakura said slowly, trying to fit the pieces together. "The part he cut away from himself. All that anger and...right. But now you're...?"

Mariku got to his feet, still looking cheerfully at the clouds overhead.

"Human, I guess," he said. "Or half-way there, at least."

Bakura blinked and then chuckled again.

"You and me, both," he said.

"You'll go and see omote, won't you?" Mariku said, looking down at him.

"_Alright_," Bakura groaned, though the prospect wasn't half as unpleasant as he was making out. "But if I get attacked, I'm blaming you."

* * *

Malik got the oddest feeling that he really was starting to go mad.

Ryou was sleeping again, of course, and here he was, standing over his bed with his arms folded, scowling at nothing in particular and just _itching _to reach out and pinch his friend's arm again, or to make good on that threat of a cold water dunk. Because he'd figured out what he wanted to say, and it needed to be said _now_, damn it. It all made sense in his head right now, but if he had to wait a few hours to put it to Ryou, he knew he'd use that time to question and second-guess himself, and in the end he'd just finish up in a hopeless, miserable muddle.

"Is that your plan?" he muttered out loud. It was surprising how quickly you started talking to yourself when you were alone – or as good as alone. "To just sleep until I confuse myself and...?"

He trailed off abruptly and froze in place when he became aware of the sound of...footsteps. Nearby. Far too nearby for comfort.

He swallowed hard. He wasn't in the habit of locking his own door during the day when he was in his apartment, and so he hadn't done so here either. But that had probably been stupid. This place was a world away from his home. Ryou almost definitely kept the door locked at all times. Hell, he'd probably piled furniture against the door when he first moved here, the place just had that _unsafe _feel to it.

Fortunately (he supposed), in a moment of strange paranoia, he had brought Ryou's trusty baseball bat with him from the hallway into the living room the day before. He picked it up uncertainly. He'd done a number of questionable things in his life, but beating another human being with a bat wasn't one of them. He rather hoped he wouldn't have to start now.

Heart beating furiously, he reached out and gripped the door-handle. The sounds could just be the product of his stressed and currently otherwise unoccupied mind, but he had to be sure. Opening the door as quietly as he could, he poked his head out into the hallway.

It was empty.

Blinking, he stepped out of the living room. Gods, he really _had _imagined it? He _was _losing it.

Then something touched his shoulder.

An odd yelping sound escaped his mouth and he automatically raised the bat as he spun around. A strong hand gripped his wrist before he could bring it crashing down on anything.

"Holy shit, not you too," a familiar (and rather startled) voice exclaimed. "Haven't you people ever heard of just saying 'hello'?"

Malik blinked again, staring at the intruder. Bakura stared back, looking unsure whether to be amused or afraid for his life.

"Haven't _you _ever heard of knocking?" Malik hissed finally, wrenching his arm out of his grasp. "And where the _hell _were you hiding-?"

"Thief King," Bakura reminded him patiently. "And I wasn't hiding. I was...well. Trying not to startle you."

"Good job on that," Malik said as his heart continued to race as if he'd just run a marathon. "What are you _doing _here? If Ryou wakes up, he's going to-"

"Let's keep our voices down, then, will we?" Bakura suggested, rolling his eyes. "And maybe move this little chat to the kitchen?"

Malik grumbled but obliged, since this got them as far from Ryou as the small apartment would allow.

"So, I repeat: why are you here?" he said, setting the bat down gingerly on the table. "Didn't we agree that it'd be best if you made yourself scarce?"

"...It's been a few days," Bakura shrugged. "I thought I should check in."

"You could've just called," Malik pointed out. "Or texted, if you've got the hang of that yet."

"I didn't think it'd be such a big problem," Bakura said, folding his arms. "I mean, I figured the company wasn't exactly great here. I know you and Ryou are friends, but you have him under house-arrest so I doubt he's in the best of tempers."

"...He just sleeps most of the time. It gets awfully quiet," Malik admitted before managing a small smile. "So, you just dropped by to raise my spirits?"

"Whatever," Bakura snorted. "Your apartment is awfully quiet just now too, you know."

"Aw, you're making me blush."

"Shut up," Bakura grunted. "It's easy for you to tell me to stay away. But in this whole city...hn. There's you, and there's Ryou. And not a lot else for me to bother with."

"You have a really roundabout way of saying you give a shit," Malik remarked, shaking his head in amusement.

"Give me a break," Bakura groaned, raking a hand through his hair agitatedly.

"Sorry," Malik chuckled. "Heart-attack notwithstanding, it is good to see you."

"Is everything alright here?" Bakura asked shortly, ignoring that last comment every bit as gruffly as Malik had come to expect.

"I think so," Malik said. "It's only been a few days, so it's hard to tell if Ryou's getting any better or not, but...well, nothing terrible has happened either."

"...Are you alright, though?" Bakura asked, stealing a sideways glance at him.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Malik said with a reassuring smile. "It feels like Ryou and I are at _war _sometimes, but I saw that coming. We've sort of...grown apart, me and him. It's only now that I'm starting to see how much."

"Don't ask me for advice about fighting with him," Bakura said, grimacing. "I don't think I _ever _win."

"Nobody ever wins," Malik corrected. "That's why it's so annoying."

"...Is there anything I can do?" Bakura asked. His eyes roved awkwardly around the room, as if following the path of a highly erratic fly. "I'm pretty much bored out of my mind. My day is just empty without you psychoanalysing me and Ryou throwing things at me."

Malik laughed. He couldn't help it. He quickly clapped a hand over his mouth and tried to silence himself, lest Ryou heard and worried that he'd finally flipped his lid.

"Um," he managed finally, "Jou missed a few things on that shopping list I gave him the other day. He mostly lives on microwave meals, so shopping for actual _food _isn't his strong suit."

"...You want me to go grocery shopping?" Bakura interpreted, looking faintly scandalised.

"It'd be a big help," Malik said with his most innocent and imploring smile. Bakura shook his head irritably.

"The things I've been reduced to..." he muttered.

"It's not so bad," Malik said breezily, locating a pen and a scrap of paper and starting to jot down anything that came to mind. "Besides, it's the twenty-first century. It's about time we got you...domesticated."

Bakura swatted him lightly over the head. He just laughed again.

It didn't take long for him to finish making the list, and Bakura took it with undisguised disdain before leaving. The silence was more noticeable and suffocating after he was gone. Malik supposed he'd been getting used to it before that little shake-up to his day.

He heaved a sigh and wandered back into the bedroom where Ryou was, of course, still fast asleep.

"...I figured out why it's different for me," he stated sullenly. "You're right, I don't know where...Mariku is. And I don't plan on finding out. But the difference between you and me is that I'm not letting the things he did ruin my whole life. Bakura is your excuse for everything. There's no way forward for you until you let this go."

He paused.

"And even if it doesn't matter to you right now..." he went on, "I think he wants to...I dunno. Be part of things. Look after you. Y'know, make sure you're ok _always _and not just now." He snorted with rueful laughter and shook his head. "Even if he isn't quite ready to _admit_ it."

* * *

When Bakura returned to Ryou's apartment, embarrassingly laden with white plastic bags full of food, he found Mariku loitering outside, looking extremely conspicuous in his ridiculous cloak.

"You're going to get spotted sooner or later, you know," Bakura told him dully.

"I'm careful," Mariku replied, eyeing the bags with interest. "Where did you go?"

"You mean you didn't follow me for once?" Bakura drawled, rolling his eyes. "Thanks to you, I got sent to run errands. You know people used to be scared of me? You know I used to have a _reputation?_"

"What did you buy?" Mariku asked, ignoring his wounded rant. His gaze alighted on something sticking out the top of one bag. "What's that?"

"Those are leeks," Bakura said as patiently as he could. "Apparently that's what you give to people when they're sick."

"What do you do with them?"

"...You eat them," Bakura said with a deep frown. "What _else _would you do with them...?"

Mariku shrugged.

"How're things on the Malik-radar now?" Bakura asked him, making a conscious decision not to pursue the leek line of enquiry.

"You scared him. He _really _wanted to hit you. But he's calmer now. Better."

"...Good."

"Are you going to see him again?"

"Well this food isn't for _me_."

"Don't scare him again," Mariku said almost sternly.

"What, is that your job?" Bakura snorted. He felt something very akin to guilt when Mariku just looked forlornly at the ground. "_Alright, _I'll do my best."

He stomped up the dreary stairwell and decided to play nice and give a warning knock this time before he barged inside. (Due in part, admittedly, to the fact that his head had no desire to get reacquainted with that baseball bat.) Unfortunately, Malik must have locked the door after he left, and being weighed down with bags of food prevented Bakura from locating his lock-picking equipment before Malik answered the door.

"...You locked me out," Bakura said accusingly.

"Not you specifically," Malik replied with a blink. "Just being safety-conscious."

Bakura continued grumbling as he dragged himself and his offerings to the kitchen.

"I come bearing gifts," he muttered, dumping everything on the table.

"Did you pay for that stuff?" Malik asked.

"Why does _that _matter?" Bakura countered, raising an eyebrow. "And yes, actually. Robbing a discount supermarket doesn't quite provide the same thrill as robbing a tomb stuffed full of traps and magic."

"I just wondered," Malik said vaguely.

"...What's the matter?" Bakura asked suspiciously, peering at him. He rolled his eyes.

"Money's going to become a problem, is all," he said. "Isis and Rishid are sending me extra funds now that I'm out of a job, but it's still less than I had before. And Ryou can't work just now, and I _really _doubt he's got savings put aside for an emergency like this..."

"Don't worry about money," Bakura ordered. "Gods, don't you worry about _enough? _Money...isn't an issue."

Malik stared at him for a very long moment. His expression was that of a parent waiting for their child to own up to some gross misdemeanour.

"No, I haven't robbed a bank," Bakura growled quietly.

"Then what are you up to?" Malik asked.

"You _know _I get paid at that..._place_," Bakura reminded him. "It's nothing great but it's money I don't even need. And just because Ryou's laid-up doesn't mean I am. There's always something that needs done at that dump."

"...So now you're the breadwinner, huh?" Malik said, a smile slowly spreading across his face. Bakura wasn't sure he liked the gleeful amusement in his eyes.

"Well, you're the full-time nurse," Bakura snorted. "How's your patient, anyway? Anything new?"

"Not in the last few hours," Malik informed him, still smiling. "He was still sleeping a minute ago."

"Is that good?"

"I hope so."

"At least he can't try to kill me while he's sleeping, I guess," Bakura chuckled.

"Yeah, it's pretty much the only time that it's relatively safe for you to see him," Malik agreed casually.

Bakura narrowed his eyes at him, as if wondering if he was being led into some kind of trap.

"What? Are you going to tell me you don't want to?" Malik challenged with a smirk that was far from innocent. "Come on."

Bakura scowled but reluctantly followed him as he turned and led the way into the bedroom. Luckily, Ryou hadn't woken in Malik's brief absence, so for the first time in a long time Bakura found himself in his former host's presence without the threat of imminent injury looming over him.

"...He doesn't look so good," he remarked at length. When he'd inadvertently discovered Ryou's ailing health, one of the dead give-aways had been the alarming lack of colour in his face. His complexion now seemed to have swung to the other extreme – rather than sickly-pale, his face was flushed, particularly his cheeks, which were practically glowing.

"Well. He's sick," Malik said flatly. He swept Ryou's bangs away from his forehead and pressed his hand against it before grimacing. "His temperature is up a little today."

"A little?" Bakura said sceptically. He didn't think Ryou looked especially relaxed for someone supposedly resting and recuperating, either. His breath was coming just a little too quickly, and his eyes were visibly flicking back and forth behind his slightly scrunched eyelids. "I think he's dreaming."

"Maybe," Malik said with a shrug. "His sleeping pattern, if he ever had one, is totally messed up just now. I wouldn't be surprised if he was having all sorts of weird dreams."

"Not as weird as the ones I've been having since I got back, I bet," Bakura snorted.

The timing was almost comical. Bakura had barely finished speaking when Ryou suddenly became even more restless – his forehead twitched into a frown and his lips parted slightly and began to move just a little. For the most part no sound came out, but one word escaped him with startling clarity. It left a stunned silence in its wake.

"...What did he just say?" Malik asked finally.

"You know what he just said," Bakura replied with a heavy calmness he didn't really feel. "You know the Ancient Egyptian language."

"Yeah, but _he _doesn't-!" Malik sputtered. "How could he possibly-?"

"You know exactly how," Bakura interrupted shortly.

Malik was quiet for a long moment, his bewildered stare flicking rapidly between Bakura's stony face and Ryou's sleeping one. His eyes widened when he suddenly understood.

"Dreams," he said disbelievingly. "He's having the same kind of dreams as you. You see things from his life and he..."

"Brat," Bakura muttered venomously. "He has no right. And he's never even _said _anything."

"You've seen all kinds of things about him. You have no more right," Malik shot back at him sharply. "And have you ever mentioned your dreams to _him_? I don't think you have."

"...No," Bakura admitted. The momentary fury drained from his entire frame, leaving him looking oddly tired. "You're right. I should've known, anyway. A connection works both ways."

"I can't believe I never even _thought_..." Malik groaned, shaking his head. He paused and looked pensive. "You know this means that he'll see...well. The truth."

"You don't know that," Bakura growled softly.

"He's going to find out!" Malik insisted, looking frustrated. "Have any of _your _dreams shown you some trivial, pointless scene? Sooner or later he's going to find out about your village and Zorc and-"

"Let it go, Malik," Bakura said warningly.

"Would you prefer for him to just see it in a dream? Don't you want to tell him?"

"That would involve a conversation. He and I don't really _do _conversation," Bakura reminded him, turning away. "Just...leave it."

"But-"

"I said _leave it_," Bakura repeated, leaving the room. A moment later Malik heard him leave the apartment too. He stood unmoving next to Ryou's bed, trying to process this latest revelation. He felt a faint jolt when that same word slipped past Ryou's lips again, still in that dead language he couldn't possibly know.

_Mother._

* * *

Night-time had become a ...strange time for Ryou.

Since his horrendously strong medication had him dead to the world for most of the daylight hours, sleep didn't come easily to him after the sun went down. He'd take his last batch of antibiotics with his evening meal and be promptly out cold, and then he'd wake up close to midnight and that'd be it. After dozing all day, he'd finally feel _awake, _well-rested and ready to go, and he'd want to get up and _do _something despite his scratchy throat and sore head and generally bunged-up respiratory system.

Except, by that time of night, Malik would finally have relented in his bedside vigil and gone to sleep himself, and Ryou wouldn't want to wake him. (Because Malik was reluctant to sleep when Ryou was ill – _because who knew what he might get up to, hm? – _and so every second he got was precious. And also because a sleeping Malik couldn't nag and scold and say things Ryou really _didn't _want to hear.)

And so Ryou would just lie there in the dark, trying not to move or cough or breathe too loudly. It was always so quiet. He'd try to hear Malik's breathing – if he couldn't, he'd sit up just to make sure that he _was _breathing. He'd alternate between throwing the duvet back because he was too hot and wrapping himself in it because he was suddenly shivering with the cold.

His mind would drift. Often he would...doze. It wasn't the same as _sleeping – _it was like he was floating on the line precisely halfway between waking and sleeping, that strange in-between state where reality and imagination become hopelessly confused. Things moved in the dark. He dreamed, or half-dreamed. Once, he thought he saw Mariku, standing over his bed like some harbinger of death in that crazy cloak of his. His brow was crinkled in a look of lost, puzzled concern.

"_What did you do this time?" _he asked in an anxious whisper. _"What did you do? Omote is scared, he's scared and tired and upset-"_

Ryou blinked and he was gone. In hindsight, he supposed he'd probably never been there at all.

But none of that was as bad – as _strange _– as the dreams that came to him during the day, when he was in a deep, somewhat-drug-induced slumber that was hard to escape from.

Mostly he dreamed of other people. Amane. His mother. Malik (the one from before and the one of now). Sometimes Yuugi and the others. Sometimes the friends he'd watched fall into comas one by one.

But more often he dreamed of another mother, another little sister. A girl who wasn't Amane and a woman he didn't know. But in those strange, vivid, hot and dry dreams, he was brother and son to them. And they always called him Bakura, and he always answered.

He tried to forget when he woke up.

* * *

The Lot was quiet that night, which Bakura thought was just typical. He needed something to occupy himself – _anything _to take his mind off the bombshell that Ryou had unintentionally dropped on him with that one single word.

Mariku hadn't followed him here, seeming to sense that he _really _needed to be left alone right now. The other Lot employees seemed to be getting the same vibe, if the wide berth and nervous glances they were giving him were any indication.

There simply wasn't enough for him to do, though, and he was left with no choice but to consider the afternoon's...incident. He simmered at the _obviousness _of it – why had it never occurred to him that Ryou was most likely to be experiencing the same kind of strange dreams? And he wondered how much Ryou already knew. What had he seen so far? Surely not the massacre. Not even Ryou could have failed to mention _that_.

Bakura clenched his fists tightly. He didn't want Ryou to see Kul Elna's last night. No one deserved to witness that kind of horror.

He couldn't help but feel it was...unfair, though. That he still couldn't see the family he'd lost all that time ago, and yet Ryou could.

Bakura hadn't thought about his mother in a long time.

And that was insane, considering he'd spent three thousand years and then some completely fixated on avenging her and the rest of Kul Elna. How long had it been? When was the last time he'd thought of a single individual loved face instead of just the generic whole...?

He couldn't even remember.

But, of course, Zorc had stolen his humanity. Zorc had twisted it all up in his head, and made him fight out of rage and hate instead of love. Zorc had made it about the _principle _of the thing, the _injustice, _the fact that the Pharaoh had dared take something from him-

At least, Bakura hoped it had been Zorc.

Remembering his mother made him feel somewhat queasy. (Nervous – as if he were a child again, misbehaving and hoping she didn't catch him.) She'd been no soft, lullaby-singing darling – that was how the modern world liked to depict mothers, wasn't it? It made Bakura want to laugh out loud, but he was oddly paranoid that she'd somehow hear him. The memories of her were suddenly vivid. A strong woman, harsh and work-hardened. A fan of tough love. She'd called him her jackal-child – _'look at you, you scrawny creature, always creeping around for scraps to steal! Do you bite too, hm? Do you need a slap?'_

Oh yes, the slaps. She'd probably dealt him more slaps than hugs or kisses in his eight years with her.

And he'd loved her so fiercely that, if he'd ever stopped to think about it and let it fill him up, it felt like some kind of maddened fever that his body just couldn't contain.

And now...

He shifted uncomfortably. Well. Maybe it was good that she wasn't here now. She probably wouldn't even recognise him.

Bakura stared down blankly at the pale skin of his hands and arms – a complexion his new form must have somehow inherited from his time as a parasite in Ryou's similar body. He wasn't normally one to give much thought to how he looked, but just then, thinking about his family and friends, he felt that now that he no longer even looked like one of them, he'd finally lost his last link to them. His race, his heritage.

That hurt.

He wondered what his mother would have thought of Ryou.

(...That sounded weird. Like he wondered whether she would have considered Ryou a good choice of _wife _or something.)

He sighed heavily. Now that he was back in his right mind again (relatively speaking) and didn't have some bastard demon screwing with his head, he had drawn the sombre conclusion that his fellow villagers wouldn't have approved of the lengths he went to in the pursuit of revenge. Especially his mother. Gods. If she was restored to the world now, even if she did recognise him, she wouldn't acknowledge him. Because no way could this be her son, she didn't raise her son to steal and murder and _forget who he was supposed to be-_

Bakura's mouth quirked into a humourless smile. And of course, he knew without a doubt that, of all the atrocities he'd committed in the name of justice, his cruelty to and disregard of Ryou would be the thing that infuriated her most.

Because his mother would have liked Ryou, he decided. The old Ryou, especially. She would have called him a good, well-mannered boy. (_'Not like you, you nasty little jackal, why can't you behave like that-?') _Ryou would have been the kind of play-mate she always wanted her son to have. Because Bakura could have toughened him up a bit, and maybe Ryou could have softened him just a little.

Bakura could just imagine confronting the fuming spirit of his mother now, and trying to explain himself. He could picture the exchange perfectly in his head – children knew their parents, especially their mother. Eight years was long enough to etch her permanently into his mind. He could see it all. She'd be screeching at him and he'd be trying to get a few sentences in edge-ways. And she'd be clouting him over the head between every second word and he'd let her because she was his damn _mother _and even the King of Thieves has to take a lashing from his mother when he knows he's done wrong.

'_You miserable stupid boy, didn't I teach you anything? _(Smack.) _Didn't your mother teach you better than that, didn't I tell you – ALWAYS TELL YOU – that you don't treat people like that? What makes you think you're any better than any other person-?'_

'_I'm sorry, I- _(Smack.) _Everything I did was for you, for the village, for everyone-'_

'_STUPID BOY. _(Smack.) _You sure went and lost your head, didn't you? Your mother wasn't happy to die, none of us were, but don't you think we were happy my jackal-brat survived? And THEN _(Smack.) – _you make us watch you forget everything we ever taught you! Making deals with demons! _(Smack.) _Hurting people who had nothing to do with nothing! _(Smack.) _AND THEN THAT BOY, THAT POOR BOY, YOU HURT HIM AND BROKE HIM LIKE THE DEMON YOU ARE-!'_

'_I-I'm not! I didn't mean to-!'_

(It would do no good – his mother had never been the type to accept excuses.)

'_Quiet! _(Smack.) _If anyone had hurt you like that, I would have cut out their heart and burnt it. So to know my own stupid boy would do such a thing-! Why would you do that, DIDN'T I TEACH YOU BETTER THAN THAT-?'_

'_**I'm sorry! **__I'll...I'll...'_

'(Smack.) _You'll __**what? **__Hm? What, my stupid boy?'_

'_I'll fix it.'_

'_You will, hm?'_

'_Y-yes. Yes! I'll take care of him. I'll keep him safe.'_

'_For how long, little thief-brat?'_

'_Forever. I'll take care of him. Always. Forever.'_

'_...Keh. Good. You fix it. And don't mess up this time, my idiot boy.'_

'_I won't. I promise.'_

Bakura snorted to himself. He needed some sleep.

When Kazuma finally handed him his pitiful wages for the night, he trudged back to Malik's silent apartment, wanting nothing more than to just lose himself in the painless relief of unconsciousness.

Unfortunately, a peaceful night's rest just wasn't on the cards for him.

* * *

_It was a funny kind of feeling, coming home to find someone else already outside your apartment door._

_I frowned tiredly as I finished climbing the last flight of stairs (the elevator was broken again, typically) and caught sight of the unfamiliar figure hovering awkwardly on my doorstep. He was turned away from me, so I couldn't tell much about him other than the fact that he was, in fact, a him. My first thought was that he was either selling something or he had the wrong apartment. His blond hair, dark skin and loose-fitting dark clothing weren't awfully familiar to me._

_I gave a small sigh as I approached, a little irked by this unscheduled interruption to my daily routine. Especially since today had been a __**bad day **__and I really just wanted to go inside and sleep._

"_Can I help you?" I said politely enough, but the words seemed to hit him like the lash of a whip. He looked as if he had been trying to convince himself to reach out and ring the doorbell, and at the sound of my voice his head jerked around to face me so quickly I wondered that he didn't snap his neck. _

_Until this point I had still been entertaining my little 'wrong address' theory, but when I saw his face it struck a strange chord somewhere deep inside my mind. Like something half-remembered from a dream. I wondered if I knew him from somewhere. It was the eyes, mostly – the pale lilac eyes with the striking black markings underneath, curving across his cheekbones. I recognised those eyes. I was sure of it._

"_Ryou Bakura?" he questioned, but something about the way his voice caught, forcing itself around my name, and the look that crossed his face upon seeing me (the look of a person who's just realised they're going to puke) told me that he knew exactly who I was. I wasn't sure why the sight of me would provoke such a reaction, but I hoped he could keep it together. I wasn't feeling so great myself, and the last thing I needed was some demi-stranger expiring on my welcome mat._

"_That's me. And you..." I trailed off, noticing the blossoming panic in my chest for the first time. Because some part of me did know this boy, did remember him, and that part was __**not happy. **_

_My thoughts turned slightly frantic – __**You. I know you. How, when...? Oh, wait. Yes. I do know you, you're him, you're...you're...**_

"_Malik Ishtar," he informed me quietly just as my brain succeeded in snatching up the name from the depths of a closed-up box at the back of my mind._

_I stared at him. What else could I do? What was I supposed to say to this boy I barely knew, whom I didn't think I'd ever exchanged a single word with?_

_My heart gave a sickening lurch. This boy who sided with __**him, **__fought with __**him...**_

_I took a step back._

"_What do you want?" I asked warily in a voice more shrill than I'd intended. I'd never been any good at hiding fear. He could undoubtedly see it rising in me now, like a cloud of thickening smoke._

_He surprised me, though. What had I expected? A smirk, a knife, a hostage situation unfolding in my nearby living room? _

_That wasn't what I got._

_He shut his eyes briefly and seemed to physically recoil from my tense words, albeit with a rather resigned expression, as if my mistrust hurt him even though he'd been expecting it. It made me pause. _

"_...To talk," he said, not looking at me. His voice sounded nervous, and his hands seemed unable to keep still. "I just...I wondered if I could talk to you."_

_My suspicion didn't go away. I frowned questioningly at him, but he kept his eyes trained on the floor, sandy hair hanging in his face. I couldn't imagine what he'd want to talk to me about._

_Malik must have misinterpreted my lengthy, contemplative silence as dismissal or disdain. He lowered his head further, looking almost as if he were bowing._

"_Please?" he added in a voice so hollow and desperate that it almost broke my heart._

_I knew that I was stupid and that I, of all people, should really have learned not to be so quick to trust others, but I couldn't help but pity him then. He seemed...sad? No, that wasn't it. It was something much worse than just __**sadness **__that hung around him. Something darker. Crueller. _

_And the 'please' really caught my attention. I couldn't remember the last time anyone had __**asked **__me for anything instead of just __**taking.**_

"_I...I suppose," I said uncertainly, rummaging in my pocket for my key. "Um...let's go inside."_

_A look of mild surprise crossed his face at this invitation but he didn't comment. He didn't say a word or lift his gaze while I fumbled with the lock and eventually opened the door, and he remained silent as I led the way into the apartment. I couldn't help but think that he was keeping very quiet for someone who wanted to talk._

"_Do you want something to drink?" I asked out of sheer, ingrained polite habit and immediately felt stupid. This wasn't exactly shaping up to be a light-hearted social call, after all._

"_No, thanks."_

_At least my dumb question elicited a response. That silence had been rather painful._

_We went into the living room, where I sat on the lone armchair and Malik took a seat on the sofa. He perched himself right at the end, up against the armrest, as if worried about taking up too much space._

"_What did you want to talk about?" I ventured cautiously when he just stared at his knees for a few moments, like he was waiting for permission to speak. I had heard stories of Malik Ishtar – brash, arrogant, never short on words – and I was getting honestly confused._

"_...I don't know how much you remember about Battle City..." he started, daring to glance up at me, seemingly hoping for an estimate._

"_Not much at all," I replied. It came out cooler, curter than I'd expected. "Yuugi and the others filled me in on most of the details, though."_

_He nodded in understanding. He knew what I meant. __**I know what you did.**_

"_First, you should know that I don't want you to feel sorry for me. That's not why I'm here," he said. His voice was still quiet but it was also the closest it had come yet to being firm. "I'm here because...well. The trials are meant to be over, aren't they? Everything to do with the Pharaoh and the Millennium Items is meant to be done. But I don't feel like it's all over. And so...I thought maybe I'm meant to come back here. To make up for the things that I did."_

"_Have you been to see Yuugi yet?"_

_The question seemed to surprise him. He blinked a few times, looking properly animated (properly __**alive**__) for the first time._

"_...No," he replied. "No, I came to you first because..."_

"_...Because?"_

"_Because I __**hurt **__you, I..."_

"_I know why you came here first," I found myself saying with distant, bleak calm. "I know what you want me to tell you."_

_Malik dared to look at me again. Dared to look hopeful._

"_You want to know why it doesn't feel good to be free." I gave a shaky laugh. "Do you want me to tell you why it just feels empty? Do you think I know?"_

_He stared. I'd expected him to be disappointed – despairing, maybe, that he'd come crawling for answers from the one person he'd thought could give them, only to find I was as lost as he was. And I could see it in him now – he felt it too, that sense of drifting aimlessly now that the 'destiny' we'd never been in control of had ended and left us to rot._

_He didn't look disappointed, though. _

"_You understand," he breathed._

_I laughed again, and maybe I sounded crazy but what did it matter?_

"_You have no idea how much," I told him._

* * *

Bakura woke feeling sick. In the aftermath of the dream, one image remained branded onto his mind – that of a skinny, scared-looking stranger with hollow cheeks and deep, dark shadows around their tired eyes-

"No way, Malik," he moaned, burying his face in the pillow.

* * *

_**END!**_

_**LOOK WHO'S STILL ALIVE 8D**_

_**(Hint: it's me x3)**_

_**Sorry if you had to go back and read a few of the previous chapters to remind yourself of what's going on. I know I did xD;**_

_**I can't apologise enough for the horribly long wait. You'll probably be glad to know that that was my first and last Fanfic Contest over the summer. It was fun and I'm pretty happy with the fics I wrote, but my poor WIPs suffered far too much ;A; Furthermore, college is now happily nomming on all my free time, so updates might be somewhat sporadic for a while. But not as bad as one every six months. At least, I hope not.**_

_**HUMUNGOUS thank you's to Junki, Out-Of-Control-Authoress, IceDragon1095, Obradyroxmysox, xxfangirlx, Tying, Shamrokk, hiddencry, pride1289, GoodAndPl3nty, CandyDevil, Hikari-Kira1, Hawaiianbabidoll, A Soul Alone, MaaTheDinosaur, guardianxofxmoon, Santora, Callette, Bokmal14, Lachen, Metalmark, ilovemanicures, Teddy syn, SilversShadow13, SoraSlayer, AliceCambio, thooruchan, PurpleWildcat2010, Enjeru, bbb136, albino-yaoi, Affy-Bakura, bleach15, Seto K4iba1, Tender Loving Care, SHADOWoftheFOX, Kek-t, Gee, Sizacu, Twilight-Imp-626, kal277, Yuui, Dark Blood Lust, StrawberryAshes, Kitsune Demon Girl, Fictatious, Black Satellite, Holly-Sempai, Aesop's Julie, Triva, BattleGoddess126, KittyWoman12, killerdoodlebug, VampirePrinssess, Mira, Tiikerikissa, sefina, Lilac Rose6, Franklyn, FanGorl, ACE329, BlackPanther1987, XionItachi, D Magic, Ilitia, xXMekkzyFwuffzXx, Hotaru Layla, Explosive Sugarberry, Mademoiselle Evandra, Aicutora, DarkMagicianMidget, crazyhikari, Professor lolz, TexasDreamer01, staidwaters, CrimsonEyes27, silvawolves, Hiira, TalaMattYazamaki, Proof of Repair, asdfasdfg, blazingoldarts, Enjeru, Rena, Strange Liou, snoopygirl11, noffermans, bakura kagamine ishtar 2173 and sunokofairytale. SUCH LOVELY REVIEWS, I'M SORRY I KEPT YOU WAITING SO LONG D'x**_

_**And thank you to sefina for being this chapter's celebrity-guest-beta! xD Because poor LadyBlackwell's time is also getting nommed. ILU LB, STAY STRONG D8**_

_**Review?**_

_**Fiver x**_


	26. Do It Yourself

_**Chapter 26: Do It Yourself**_

Bakura tried to convince his eyes to focus on the brightly coloured..._thing _that had just been shoved into his face.

"You need to give it to Ryou," a voice told him.

Bakura leaned to the side so that he could see past the multi-coloured explosion. Mio was standing on a stool, looking proud of herself.

"I need to what?" he said. It had been a few days since he'd dreamed about Malik and Ryou's sort-of first meeting, and he hadn't slept well since – mainly because he was worried he'd have more dreams in a similar vein if he did. He didn't want to see anything like that again.

"It's a get-well-soon card," Mio chirped. "You and daddy said I should make one."

"...Oh. Right," Bakura said. He vaguely recalled the conversation but didn't remember contributing to the idea.

"But daddy says I'm still not allowed to go see Ryou," she pouted. "So you have to take it. You get to go see him, right?"

"Sort of." _Only when he's unconscious._

"So take it for him," she pestered, waving the card in his face again. He grimaced and took a step back.

"You keep it until it's time to leave," he said, hoping she'd forget.

Mio thought for a moment.

"I'll go put it in your coat pocket," she said finally, hopping down off her perch. Bakura sighed as she skipped off towards the cloakroom. She paused before she reached it, however, and turned back to him.

"Do you think he'll like it?" she asked, displaying it again. Now that it was more than an inch away from Bakura's eyeballs, he could see that it was a crayon drawing of a stick-person in a bed next to an enormous bunch of flowers. There were also a lot of bright red and pink love-hearts floating around.

"...You made it," Bakura said with a shrug. "So he'll like it."

Mio seemed to understand that this was the best she was going to get from him and continued on her way.

"Good answer, Touzoku," a voice whispered from behind him, causing Bakura to jump.

"Boo," Kazuma said, grinning. "I gotta admit, I used to think you were the type who'd be mean to kids if you thought no one was looking. But you're really just a softie, aren't ya...?"

"Shut up," Bakura groaned. "I'm just too tired to put much effort into being mean to _anyone_."

"I'll get her to call you 'Uncle Touzoku' if you want."

"What part of _'shut up' _do you just not-?"

"Oh, look, you're off the hook," Kazuma butted in with ease, pointing. "Your buddy's here."

Bakura looked up just in time to see Mariku sidling inside and closing the door behind him – he seemed to be becoming part of the wallpaper at the Lot, and Kazuma didn't seem to mind. Mio scampered over to him, assuming (quite correctly) that he'd be a much better person to discuss her artwork with than Bakura would ever be.

* * *

Mariku kept very quiet until he saw Bakura getting his coat and preparing to leave.

"You haven't been to see them for a while now," he said as Bakura passed him and opened the staff door.

"It's only been a few days," Bakura sighed. Without turning around, he knew that Mariku was following right at his heels. "I'm sure Malik has it all under control."

"He's getting worried. About you, maybe."

"He doesn't need to worry about _me._"

"But you worry about him. About both of them. Don't you?"

Bakura gritted his teeth and didn't reply. _Worry? Worry doesn't begin to cover it, not after what I saw. And I'm trying very hard not to _think _about that, thank-you-very-fucking-much._

"You're worried but you're hiding from them. Why? What scared you?"

"I'm not _hiding_," Bakura snapped. "And…" _I saw Ryou and Malik after you and I were gone and they were both so tired and so sad and I don't _get it _and you won't get it either_. "...It's nothing."

To Bakura's surprise, Mariku laughed at that. He had a loud, child-like laugh. He always seemed to enjoy the laughter as much as he enjoyed whatever it was that had amused him in the first place.

"You and Ryou are so _alike_," he said. "How can you fight all the time? You're just the exact same."

"What do you mean?" Bakura asked, as he knew Mariku wanted him to. Whether it was deliberate or not, Bakura didn't know, but he was learning that Mariku liked to be asked the relevant questions before he'd give proper answers.

"Hm. It wasn't so long ago. I think Ryou saw something. Maybe something scary. Maybe something about you," he said with an impish smile. "It was 'nothing' too."

Bakura stared at him for a long moment.

"He told you?" he said finally. "Ryou told you about his dreams?"

Mariku nodded.

"That's right," he said. "He did call it a dream before he called it nothing. I _wondered _if you had dreams like that too."

"Why didn't you _say something?_" Bakura ground out.

"Because it was nothing," Mariku said, still smiling. And Bakura just knew that this time, he wasn't being naive. The gleam in his eyes was far from innocent.

"...If I go and see them, will you tell me what Ryou told you?" Bakura asked. He felt bitterly humiliated at having to bargain for the information, especially with Mariku.

"But he didn't tell me anything. He just said it was nothing," Mariku said. "Isn't that annoying?"

"No kidding," Bakura muttered.

"You won't be that annoying, will you?" Mariku grinned.

Bakura blinked, taken aback, before glaring half-heartedly as he saw the circle he'd been led in.

"It seems that...things got bad, after we left. Well. Worse," he said finally.

"Bad?" Mariku repeated. "For Ryou?"

"Yeah. Malik, too."

"Bad how?" Mariku asked. He looked highly attentive now that Malik had been mentioned.

"I don't really understand it. Something was just _wrong _with the two of them. It's not enough to say that they were sad. That doesn't...cover it."

"Why would they have been sad?"

"I don't know. They were free, they didn't need to worry about...y'know, _us. _They should've been happy. But instead..." Bakura shook his head in frustration. "Were people always this _complicated? _I don't remember."

"I don't think they were sad because we were gone," Mariku said with a shrug.

"…No."

"But I guess it must have been hard for them to smile after everything we did. Even though we were gone, those things still happened, right? They must have been glad it was over. But it wouldn't have just gone away."

"How come _you _find things like this easier to understand than I do?" Bakura said. He folded his arms and tried to look uninterested instead of irritated.

"I want to learn," Mariku said, grinning again. "You waste at least half your time pretending you don't."

"Stop sounding so _wise_ and accepting of your shitty fate," Bakura said, pushing himself off the wall and continuing down the street. "It's _annoying._"

"Where are you going?"

"Where do you _think?_"

* * *

Malik was scribbling down notes from one of his textbooks when he heard the knock at the door. He was missing a lot of classes because of his refusal to leave Ryou to his own devices for even one minute, but he was corresponding with his professors as best he could to make sure he didn't fall too far behind. And he always got a lot of studying done in the hours when Ryou was sleeping, and during the endless, bitter silences that would fall after one of their frequent arguments.

Ryou heard it too and turned his head with a suspicious frown. Malik rose from his seat and went to answer it.

"Malik, be careful," Ryou said. Their latest squabble (about Bakura, of course) had only ended minutes before – and had not come to a peaceful conclusion – so it was nice to know that Ryou still cared whether he got attacked or not.

"I'll be fine," Malik said, leaving the living room and closing the door behind him.

He was relieved but not too surprised to open the front door and find Bakura lounging against the adjacent wall, doing a rather stellar job of looking not at all interested in him.

"Let me guess," Malik said, fighting down a smile. "You were passing and thought you might as well drop by."

"Something like that," Bakura replied.

"You're getting good at knocking, at least," Malik said.

"Yeah, well, I've got no way of knowing what you might have armed yourself with by now. The bat was bad enough."

"...It's good to see you," Malik finally relented. "Where have you been?"

"It hasn't been _that _long since I was here," Bakura said, rolling his eyes. "Am I supposed to call in every day like your carer or something?"

Malik arched an eyebrow.

"_Should_ I be worried?" he asked. "You're even grumpier than usual and you look like hell."

"I'm fine," Bakura said shortly. "How's Ryou?"

"Awake," Malik replied, stepping out onto the landing and quietly closing the door behind him. "It'd be nice if you could just come in and visit like a normal person, but...well. He's even grumpier than usual today, too."

"Didn't know that was possible," Bakura said.

"He seems better, though. He's awake more. Coughs less. But I should get back. He'll start thinking I've answered the door to an axe murderer."

"Yeah. Or worse, me."

"I'm trying, you know," Malik said. "To make him be...a little more understanding."

"You don't need to try and talk him out of hating me," Bakura snorted.

"I want to. I don't want it to go on like this forever."

"Get back to your patient, nurse."

Malik rolled his eyes and turned to go but paused to look back at him.

"You sure you're ok?" he said. "You really don't look good at all."

"I'm _fine. _Stop worrying."

"Promise you'll go home and sleep," Malik said, pointing an authoritative finger at him. "You definitely need it."

"Right, sleep. Yeah, ok," Bakura said, jamming his hands uncomfortably into his pockets. A crinkling sound accompanied the motion and he frowned. His left hand reappeared, clutching something.

"...Make that yourself?" Malik asked, his eyebrows nearly meeting his hairline as he visibly suppressed a fit of laughter.

"It's from that kid at the Lot," Bakura grumbled, handing the slightly crumpled card over with a haughty scowl. "You know, the one who's going to marry Ryou one day."

"Sure."

"Shut up, Malik." Bakura headed for the stairs, signalling that his check-up was officially over.

"Remember to sleep," Malik reminded him.

"Whatever."

Malik rolled his eyes and retreated into the apartment, locking the door behind him.

"Who was it?" Ryou asked when he came back into the room. His tone was just a little too casual, and Malik knew he was suspicious.

"Your friend from work. The one with the little girl," he replied, setting the card on the bedside table. "She made this for you."

Ryou picked it up and smiled for the first time since he'd been placed under house arrest. Malik felt it was a shame that neither Mio nor Bakura got to see it.

At least Ryou would undoubtedly thank Mio later.

* * *

It seemed Malik had spoken too soon when he'd said Ryou's condition was improving.

Bakura did as he was told and went home that night and reluctantly tried to sleep. He didn't know that, despite all the medicine being pumped through his system, Ryou had started running a fever. Malik was sitting up with a basin of cool water and all the cloths he could find, trying not to panic and trying to get it to break. And Bakura knew nothing of it – until he managed to fall asleep, at which point it quickly became clear that _something _was damn wrong. Bakura didn't claim to know much about spirit-links, but it seemed he and Ryou were going to suffer this one together. Maybe that was fair. Maybe. He didn't know.

The dreams came thick and fast, never pausing to let him make sense of them, but simply rushing by like the view from a speeding train. Vibrant, pulsing dreams. Feverish. Snapshots and scraps from three years of a life he'd devastated and then left to just _deal with it_.

The scenes bled into each other almost seamlessly. And he couldn't wake up until it was _done._

* * *

_Malik only ever spoke about his darkness once in those few months when it was just me and him. _

_(The few months of Malik Ishtar and Ryou Bakura, two young men who were _stuck in a rut, _who were _looking for their path in life, _who were, in a word, _fucked.)

_We were drinking. I didn't know what and I didn't know how much. Who cares? Really? The end result was always the same._

"_But you see," Malik was explaining with a frown of deep concentration, his hands sweeping the air as he spoke. "He...y'know, _him_...he wasn't the whole _problem_**. **__Everyone thought he was. I __thought so. But no, that's not right. He wasn't the disease. He was more like a symptom, a...whatsit...a _manifestation_**.**__ He was the part that _got out."

'_He' and 'him' were Malik's only names for Mariku. Because saying his name was like swearing at your auntie or saying 'Candyman' three times into a mirror. You just _don't do it.

"_So they cut him out of me," he went on. "Like a lobotomy, yeah? Cut away the bit that's sick and rotten and everything's fine."_

_I nodded my understanding. I knew all about having part of you cut out, and then wondering why you were bleeding._

"_Didn't work," Malik said. "There's still a part of me upstairs that's _sick_. Or maybe it's all of me..."_

_He trailed off and considered this possibility. I looked at him, and I was _so _drunk, but I could see that he was in that fog __he talked about sometimes, that dreaded fog. His eyes were limpid and vague and I knew he was thinking something along the lines of: 'if I put a gun to my head and pull the trigger, will that make the sickness go away?'_

"_I'm insane," he concluded after a moment. He looked heartbroken._

"_You're not," I whispered. And he wasn't. He was right the first time – he was sick. We were both sick, in our own way. The only difference was, he was going to get better-_

* * *

"_It's open, just come in," I called as loudly as I could (it wasn't really very loud) when the doorbell rang. I knew who it was. Only Malik could make my doorbell sound so tentative, so apologetic. He let himself in, not looking comfortable about it but helpless to disobey. _

"_Hey," I said, trying to smile – sometimes I could force myself when it was for him._

"_...You're not at school," he replied, glancing awkwardly between me and the floor._

"_Lucky for you," I said with affected lightness._

"_You've not been for a long time now," he said._

"_No," I sighed in agreement. _

_Silence stretched out, like a blank section in a wonky video tape._

"_You're not going back, are you?" he said. He looked so wretched. I realised that this – me being here all the time, barely waking, barely moving – was hurting him. I let my head rest against the back of my chair and I felt tears pricking my eyes._

"_I'm so tired," I said in a wobbly voice. "I'm so-"_

* * *

_I cried the day he showed me the scars. I'd made myself swear I wouldn't – for his sake – but I couldn't help it. _

_I'd always tried not to mention his back, but he must have known I was curious. He asked if I wanted to see. In a weird way I think he wanted me to see, too – as another apology, maybe, or a glimpse into _where it all started._But most of him didn't want me to see. (Because most of him was shy and scared and swallowed up by that fog.) His hands were shaking when he reached up to take off his shirt and his eyes were down, looking anywhere but at me. He was embarrassed. His shoulders curved inwards as he tried to hide. _

_And I looked, and I couldn't help myself. I cried. Because that was what pain looked like. My hand and my arm, I thought _that _was pain. But no, this was it, carved into Malik's back. And it seemed so unfair that something created out of so much pain and blood could still look so _fascinating_**, **__so intricate and almost beautiful in its painstaking neatness. I cried and I reached out for him – for the first time we made contact, skin on skin, human to human. I held onto him and I cried for him, for me, for reasons I couldn't even explain. He didn't cry. He sat there for the longest moment, tense and nervous, not knowing what to do. Then he let out a long sigh. Maybe he realised he could relax a little around me, because I needed him now just as much as he thought he needed me. Softly, he called me Ryou for the first time._

_A long time ago, I asked myself what the word friendship even meant. I had the answer now. It was-_

* * *

"_Isis and Rishid aren't like me," Malik said one day when we were discussing families. (Ooh and what a cheery conversation that turned out to be – between us we still didn't have enough to make one good old nuclear family). I was about to say something trite and breezy like 'well, everyone's different, right?' but then I decided to spare him the bullshit._

"_Because they're happy to stay in Egypt?" I asked instead. He blinked as though he'd never thought of that before._

"_Yeah, there's that," he said. "I just think they're a whole other type of person. I find it hard to relate to them."_

"_Why?"_

"_Because," he said, "we all went through the same _shit_**. **__I mean, they were stuck in that tomb longer than I was. But it never beat them. They never cracked under it. I did."_

_The hate was in his eyes – the insatiable drive to destroy himself. Because how dare he crack, how dare he be the one who broke down in that dark hole under that first-class fruit-loop of a father-?_

"_I don't think it's because they're stronger than you," I said._

"_They are. Always have been. Even now, look, they're living as if it all never happened, they're just-"_

"_Then that makes them more stupid than you too," I snapped. Malik shrank back. "It would take a weak, stupid person to be so unaffected by something so horrible. And a strong, smart person would never let someone hurt their little brother, not even their own father, not even if they'd been told it was important, that it was such an honour..."_

_I trailed off. My nails were gouging into my palms. I thought of Amane – sure we fought and bickered as much as any siblings, but oh God if anyone tried to hurt her, I didn't care if they were twenty feet tall, I would have torn them apart. _

_(Then someone did hurt her, someone hurt her dead. The guy who drove his 4x4 over the top of my mother and sister had been skunk-drunk, driving so fast I bet they never even saw him coming. He went down for it, of course. I saw his picture in the paper and I sat and stared at it and I wondered if I could kill him. I wished, just for once, that I had the power to take souls and put them into lead figurines. I thought I might have enjoyed it – putting that man in games he was never going to win-)_

"_Ryou?" Malik said._

"_Don't say they're not like you, as if they're better than you," I blurted out. "They're not, they're just-"_

* * *

_There was a bandage around his left forearm. Narrow, and about equidistant between his wrist and elbow._

"_What happened to your arm, Malik?" I asked. _

"_Oh," he said, looking down at the bandage as if just remembering about it. He tried to tug his sleeve over it. "It's just a scratch. I was doing some DIY. Y'know."_

"_DIY," I repeated. "That's a new word for it."_

* * *

"_What's wrong with you, Ryou?" Malik asked._

_I sighed. I was so sick of saying 'it's nothing, I'm fine, I'm just a bit tired...'_

"_I guess I've finally crashed," I said instead, staring at the ceiling. I couldn't even raise my head from the pillow to look at him._

"_Crashed?" he repeated._

"_My body," I said. "Bakura used it as his disguise for...for _years_**. **__I'd go to bed at night and wake up somewhere else. The hallway, the street, someone else's apartment. My mind was sleeping but my body..." I trailed off and took a few deep breaths. Even talking was becoming exhausting. "Do you get it? My body didn't get a break the whole time he was around. And now it's just...crashed."_

"_You'll be ok," Malik said._

"_It keeps getting worse," I said, feeling my chin tremble. "I just sleep and sleep but it gets worse instead of better."_

"_You'll be ok," Malik said again. I knew he was scared but his voice was steady. "I'll make sure you're ok."_

_I laughed quietly. He was so precious._

"_I know you-"_

* * *

_But days and days went by and it didn't get any better._

_I wasn't surprised._

* * *

_I noticed Malik was smiling more. I knew he was spending time with Yuugi and Jou and the others, so I supposed it made sense. He'd come to me first and we'd split the sadness between us, and now he'd gone to them and they offered happiness and forgiveness and relative normality._

_I wished I could like them. I wished this didn't feel like a betrayal._

_He could tell something was wrong. He kept asking me but I couldn't tell him. I snapped at him once or twice. He didn't know how hard it was, wanting him to be happy but wanting him for myself too. And if I ever told him, he'd feel guilty just for being happy in the first place._

* * *

_Oh God make this stop_

_Can't move_

_Can't wake up_

_Crashed._

_Crashedcrashedcrashed._

_Bakura. So. It wasn't enough to mess everything up while you were here?_

_I never understood you. I was always searching for your reasons, your motives, your sad story-_

_You don't have those things._

_You're just a…_

_There's no word for what you are._

_Monster demon bastard butcher thief parasite_

_All those things and more_

_No word is awful enough_

_Because you had no _reason!

_You hurt people because you like pain and blood and screaming and…_

_And you didn't need to hurt me but you did._

_It was Pharaoh you wanted, right?_

_You didn't get any closer to killing him by putting my friends into comas or chasing my father away or using my body to do all those _awful things-

_And now this._

_You're not even _here _anymore-!_

_And you're STILL FUCKING WITH ME-_

_I think I'm going to die._

_It's not fair._

_IT'S NOT FAIR!_

_I hate you._

_DO YOU HEAR ME?_

_I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU-_

_I-_

_I-_

Blackness.

And then Bakura was finally awake, soaked with sweat and gasping hoarsely for breath like a fish out of water. He lurched forward, trying to sit up, stand up, but then he was doubled over and retching helplessly over the side of the bed. He hadn't bothered eating that evening so there was nothing to come up, but his stomach was roiling and his throat burned and when it was over his mouth was filled with the awful taste of bile. He collapsed onto his back again, trying to will away the trembling in all of his limbs. When he recovered an ounce of his strength, he buried his face in the pillow and screamed as loudly as he could. His eyes were stinging and his hands were white-knuckled among the sheets, and screaming didn't even help.

He forced himself to his feet and pulled on the first clothes he found, feeling dizzy and sick but ignoring it. He stumbled out of the apartment, only remembering at the last minute to grab his key and lock the door behind him.

His feet carried him automatically through the dark Domino streets. At no point had he made any conscious decision to go to Ryou's apartment, but he knew that was where he was going. Why? What difference would it make? Didn't matter. He had to go.

When he got there, he hammered on the door, heedless of the hour. Malik was unlikely to be sleeping because something was wrong and Malik didn't really sleep when something was wrong. Bakura knew that now.

"Malik, open up," he ordered after a few moments of silence from within the apartment. It was understandable, of course – most people would probably just sit tight if someone started battering their door in the small hours of the morning, especially in a place like South Domino.

At length he heard the scrabbling sound of locks and chains being undone, and then the door swung open. Malik peered out at him and for the briefest of moments Bakura didn't see the Malik he knew at all – just a too-skinny sixteen year-old with nervous eyes and bandages on his arms from DIY-related accidents-

_(DIY. That's a new name for it.)_

"Bakura?" Malik said, snapping him back to the real world, to the _now_. "What are you doing here-?"

"I don't even know," Bakura muttered, entering the hallway and shutting the door behind him. Malik frowned.

"I told you to get some sleep," he said, folding his arms.

"You look like the one who needs to sleep," Bakura retorted. "Besides, I _did _sleep."

Uneasy understanding immediately crossed Malik's face – Bakura's strained expression and unexpected appearance at the door seemed to come together in his head to form something with a meaning.

"You had another dream," he said.

Bakura just nodded.

"What was it about?" Malik asked. Bakura brought up a hand to cover his eyes for a moment. The scenes he had unwillingly witnessed were still playing in a continuous loop in his mind, and nothing he did could make them stop.

"It was like getting machine-gunned with information," he mumbled. "It was _crazy_."

"...Are you ok?" Malik asked.

"How's Ryou?" Bakura said, ignoring the question since he was pretty sure Malik already knew the answer. "Something's wrong, isn't it? The dreams are never _fun, _but that was…just…"

"Ryou's still sleeping," Malik replied. "He had a bad fever. If it had gone on any longer I would've called the hospital, but it finally broke just a little while ago."

Bakura nodded again.

"I need to..." he started, glancing over his shoulder at the door to the bedroom. "I just..."

"Go see him," Malik said.

"What if he wakes up?" Bakura asked, eyeing the door nervously. He was scared. It was stupid, it was insane. He was scared to go in there and just see Ryou's sleeping form.

"Then...run," Malik said with a small smile. Without another word he turned away and went into the darkened kitchen, leaving Bakura to make his own mind up.

He entered the darkened bedroom as quietly as he could and approached the bed despite an overwhelming desire to keep his distance. There was a chair at the bedside where Malik had clearly been sitting, keeping watch, but Bakura didn't want to sit down as if he had a right to be here. He stood, stiffly, awkwardly, feeling the tremors returning to his limbs as the adrenaline that had brought him here faded away. Ryou was sound asleep, flat on his back in a way that reminded Bakura rather too much of a body in a coffin. His face looked flushed again and there was a square of damp cloth on his forehead. Bakura had forgotten to grab his coat in his hurry and had run all the way here in just a t-shirt, and he suddenly realised he was freezing. He reached out hesitantly and let the back of his hand rest against Ryou's scalding cheek. Ryou instinctively turned his head towards the source of the cold feeling and that broke the funeral home illusion, and that was a little better.

"…I didn't know how bad it got," Bakura said finally, keeping his voice low. "I didn't know how much you were hurting while I was chasing down the Pharaoh. And after I was gone…I didn't know that would happen! I didn't know, I never thought…" He trailed off and shook his head. "I wouldn't have stopped, though. Not back then. Even if I'd known what it was doing to you, I wouldn't have stopped. All those things you called me? You were right. Monster, parasite, whatever. I wouldn't have cared."

He drew his hand away, knowing how repulsed Ryou would be by the idea that he'd actually reached out and touched him. The silence and shadowy darkness of the room was starting to seep into his mind and he could feel himself gradually calming down at last.

"But things are different now," he went on. He knew Ryou was lost to the world right now but these things needed to be said and this was probably his only opportunity to say them. He wanted to believe that, just by saying the words, they would somehow reach Ryou. Get through to him. But he knew that was stupid. Still, he pressed on. "Maybe that doesn't matter to you. So I'm human now, so what? I still did those things. Maybe you're right to think that way. I mean, it's ok. You don't need to forgive me, or hate me any less, or…" He sighed heavily. "But you need to at least see that things are different. That I'm different. Not great. Not even good. Just different. Human. You need to let me _fix this. _I know it was my fault, ok? And I hate it. I can't take any of it back but maybe I can make things better now. I owe you a life, right? So. Let me pay my dues? Wouldn't that be best for both of us…?"

Of course, there was no reply. The room was silent apart from Ryou's slow breathing and the soft sounds of Malik moving around the kitchen. Bakura supposed he owed Malik an explanation – a better one – and he had a few questions of his own that he wanted answered, but for now he just remained where he was, soaking in the quiet and feeling his own heartbeat returning to normal.

"You really need to wake up," he informed Ryou, folding his arms across his chest. "It's way too easy to forget what a nightmare you are when you're like this. Be careful. I could almost start liking you."

After some time, Malik came into the room, took him by the wrist, and guided him gently out of there and into the kitchen. Bakura pulled away from him and sat down at the table of his own volition, not wanting to wait to be coddled like a child. Malik pushed a steaming mug towards him.

"I don't drink coffee," Bakura said automatically.

"It's tea," Malik replied with a blink.

"I don't think I drink that either."

"Shut up. People have a hot drink when things are shitty. Don't you want to learn to fit in with modern society?" Malik said, rolling his eyes and taking a sip of his own drink.

Bakura didn't argue further. He didn't know how a hot drink could possibly make any situation better but he didn't care either.

"You should probably sit down," he told Malik. "You want answers, don't you? So I'll tell you everything. But you won't like it."

Malik lowered himself into the opposite chair, looking apprehensive.

And Bakura told him everything that he'd dreamed and seen and learned about him and Ryou. The strange, painful first meeting, the developing friendship, the sadness and hurt and sickness – everything. By the time he was done, Malik looked like he'd need something a lot stronger than a cup of tea to calm him down.

"…I really hate that you get to see those things," he said. His face was set in a stiff but neutral expression, and Bakura couldn't tell if he was angry or upset or scared or all three. "I never wanted _anyone _to see that…"

"I'm not surprised," Bakura said. "You weren't looking…yourself."

"Were you shocked?" Malik asked with a sharp laugh.

"Yeah," Bakura said frankly. "And you know I don't understand people and feelings and how they work. So you're going to have to tell me what was wrong. I don't…get it. You and Ryou, you were free. It was what you both always wanted, right? So what…went wrong…?"

Malik sighed heavily.

"It's not that simple," he said, shaking his head. "When something bad comes to an end…yeah, of course that's great. But the bad stuff doesn't just disappear. Nowadays you hear about it mostly with soldiers coming home from someplace where they've seen half their friends blown to pieces. People wonder why they aren't just happy to be home. But the things you've seen or done, they never leave you – not _really_. You know that. Think about Kul Elna. Even if you'd got the revenge you were fighting for, the pain wouldn't have gone away, would it?"

Bakura didn't answer. He didn't need to.

"I was fine for a while," Malik went on. "After Battle City, I'd sometimes have these…moments. I'd just sit and stare at nothing and feel like something wasn't right. Then I'd remember that Mariku was gone, and that I was redeemed, and so everything _had _to be alright. I thought the peace felt incomplete because our duties to the Pharaoh weren't finished yet. But then…" He paused and chewed on his lower lip. "Then it _was _finished. He passed on to the afterlife. And things only got worse. Everything was meant to be perfect, so at first I ignored it. I didn't understand. I felt so ungrateful. And then I couldn't ignore it anymore. It was like a fog, those dark feelings creeping up on me. It swallowed me up completely. That's when I knew I had to do something, change something. Maybe fix something. So I came back here."

"And you found Ryou," Bakura said quietly. Malik gave a faint, sad smile. He had a faraway look in his eyes as he remembered.

"He was just the same," he said. "Free but not free. He was haunted by you. The things you did, the problems you left behind. The scars you gave him. And the _mystery_ of you, I suppose. Ryou had no chance for closure. He was your host, but he knew even less about you than the rest of us. You stormed in and bulldozed his life and he never even got to know what it was all for."

"And I…I wore out his body," Bakura said tonelessly. "And he got sick. That's what was wrong with him before."

Malik hesitated a moment.

"I don't know how true that is," he said, looking uncomfortable. "I let him believe it at the time. I guess I believed it for a while, too. And maybe that was a…contributor. But I don't think that was exactly what happened."

"What do you mean?"

"Ryou was fine for a while, too," Malik said. "Things were just starting to get bad when I met him. That seems a little weird, doesn't it? Your body can't be fooled into believing that everything is alright just because you've been told it is. Bodies are simple and demanding. If his body had been at breaking point when you left, he would have collapsed a lot sooner."

"So what does that mean?" Bakura asked, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Malik tapped his left temple with another cheerless smile.

"I think he was sick like I was. In _here_." He jabbed his temple one last time. "It manifested a little differently because the feelings were different. I can understand it now, sort of. His world had been leveled, and there was nothing he could have done to stop it. He hadn't done anything to deserve it or bring it on himself, but it had happened. When the world is so random and unfair, what's the point in trying? What's the point in _anything_ when you might get cut down at the next turn, for no reason at all…?"

"He gave up," Bakura said.

He didn't miss the way Malik's gaze swooped to the floor at those words.

"…There's something else, isn't there?" Bakura said, feeling sick all over again. "The thing you and Ryou 'locked up'. It's something worse. There's still something else and I'm going to have to see it."

Malik nodded mutely.

"It's…" he started shakily but Bakura cut him off.

"Don't tell me," he said. "I don't deserve a warning. I'll just…I'll wait for it to come. And I'll watch. And then maybe I'll understand."

"I'm sorry," Malik said, shaking his head. "I'm sorry this has to be so hard on _both _of you."

"Don't feel bad for me," Bakura snapped. "I've finally got to a point where I feel like I deserve this shit. Don't waste any sympathy on _me_."

"Shut up," Malik said again. "I'll do whatever I want."

Bakura found himself laughing at him despite himself.

"…Has Ryou been dreaming?" he asked suddenly, somber again. "Do you know?"

"I think he has," Malik replied. "It's hard to tell. Sometimes he tosses and turns something awful. Mumbles things, like that time he scared the crap out of us. But when he wakes up, he won't talk about it. I've tried to ask him and he just says it's nothing."

"Yeah, that's Ryou," Bakura said dryly. "Just…the dreams are getting steadily worse for me, aren't they? Working their way towards the worst possible thing. So if the same thing is happening to him…"

"Kul Elna," Malik finished for him. "He'll see it soon. I told you that."

"See, that's more unfairness," Bakura said with frustration. "I don't want him to see it. It's awful. It'll hurt him. Why does he have to see these things…?"

"Because you two need to learn about _each other_," Malik said exasperatedly, slumping over the table. "You're to blame for a lot of things, ok? I get that. But you're not the only one at fault."

Bakura thought about this.

"I want to be here," he said finally. "When he sees it."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Malik asked uneasily.

"I want to be here," Bakura repeated. It was not up for debate. Malik put up his hands.

"Your call," he said.

"I don't want him to…go through it alone," Bakura said. But that didn't _quite _explain his need to be here for it, and he scrabbled desperately for a better reason. "And just…I'm the only one who…"

"You don't need to explain yourself to me," Malik said with grim amusement. "This stuff is very much between _you two._" He paused and frowned. "One thing, though. How are you going to know when it happens?"

Bakura felt his connection to Ryou give a twinge of reminder.

"I'll know," he said.

* * *

_**End!**_

_**I'm back. Please don't hit me xD; This has been a tough year so far-! But hopefully I'll have more time to work on writing now that summer is approaching.**_

_**Thank you very very much to CalloftheHaunted, crazyhikari, NightFury812, Metalmark, Twilight-Imp-626, Enjeru, Carlos de Citron, HeartShapedLocket, thooruchan, SilversShadow13, Kiara victory Tatsu, IceDragon1095, BlackSatellite, BlackPanther1987, melisse, Hikari-Kira1, Fluffy no Danna, Klausolas, sorathestar, killerdoodlebug, millenniumspoon, Fictatious, Bloody Rabbit Alice, CrimsonEyes27, Kanashii Umi, xXMekkzyFwuffzXx, IntricateDivinity, RiverTear980, Schizo-of-Destiny, Lilac Rose6, pride1289, Mana, bbb136, Breathing in Snowflakes, The-Elaboration, bakura'kagamine'ishtar'2173, Vampire Prinssess, Airyballoon, PurpleWildcat2010, ilovemanicures, SHADOWoftheFOX, Arashi, CalamariCool, Seto K4iba1, ani, Caluism, SoraSlayer, Kiei, Shadow Realm Snowflakes, Karasu the Dark One, KittyWoman12, Atsuma, JustASadSong, Gee, MonaLisa20, Twitterpated Yaoi, noffermans, LadyBlackwell, XionItachi, Teddy syn, GoodAndPl3nty, StrangeLiou, SilverScaledSnowDragon, Cana-Puff, AtomBunny, D.R.A.W, SetsunaNoroi, Aeleita, Kitsune Demon Girl, Midknight123, BattleGoddess126, envoy-of-the-end, mimsiechan, Glitter and Kisses, Hengenjizai, Jess, A Soul Alone, yamiXyugi-setoXjou-4ever, winnie, erin-flight, sweetness4theheart, Xuedragonsong, BumblingLobster, Uryuu-Nipaa, Chasing, soupcan, xHoshi-Chanx, Lazy Gaga, sway-babysway, SilverFinDragon and Rainforestfrogs for all your lovely reviews ;~; And thank you to EVERYONE for being so patient with me.**_

_**I'm really sorry to all the folks who wrote me really wonderful, in-depth reviews and didn't get a reply back. Like I said, this year has been crazy, and my brain has been a puddle of soup. I promise to do a lot better from now on! And feel free to poke me on tumblr if I'm bad again. It can get quiet over there, anyway xD**_

_**I hope you liked the chapter!**_

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